• Researchers in Japan have developed a Covid vaccine in pill form
• When given to monkeys, it saw them develop the necessary antibodies
• READ MORE: FDA approves new Covid booster vaccines for every American

By Caitlin Tilley, Health Reporter For Dailymail.Com

Published: 00:05 EDT, 13 September 2023 | Updated: 00:05 EDT, 13 September 2023

British scientists are leading the charge to create a vaccine to halt the next deadly pandemic within 100 days of it breaking out.

Experts are working on a high-security project at Porton Down, the top-secret government laboratory, to develop prototype vaccines to tackle ‘Disease X’ when it hits.

The ambitious target would smash the 362 days it took to develop a Covid jab, potentially stopping crippling lockdowns in future. 

Scientists agree it is only a matter of time until the next pandemic, with a recent government report putting it among the biggest threats to life this year.

The new super-lab, to which the Mail was invited last week, is geared to work with the world’s deadliest live viruses, with more specialist ‘high-containment’ labs than anywhere in Europe. 

Working alongside academics and industry, it is the only site in the UK equipped to create a vaccine from start to finish.

Dr Jenny Harries, head of the UK Health Security Agency (UKHSA), said Britain is already primed to launch a ‘very slick and rapid response’ to the next global threat.

Speaking at the launch of the Vaccine Development and Evaluation Centre, she said it signalled a ‘step change in terms of pandemic response’, adding: ‘The risk [of another pandemic] is growing. 

‘The 100-day mission is to identify a pathogen of pandemic potential and within 100 days, you have vaccines to try and manage that.

‘This is shifting from being super ready to respond to actually trying to stop [pandemics] happening.

‘For previous vaccines it would have been five to ten years. For Covid it was 362 days, so to get to 100 days is really stretching the ambition. But if we’re going to prevent pandemics then that’s exactly what we need to do.’

Adjoining the Ministry of Defence site in Salisbury, Wiltshire, the 3,000 square metres of laboratory space is a positive ‘legacy’ of the pandemic. 

Metal hangars were erected, and wings converted from old storage and office space into state-of-the-art labs when Covid struck, running vital tests to determine government policy such as which vaccines to buy.

Its creation has seen capacity ramped up so scientists can run tests against a range of diseases on 3,000 samples each week, compared to 100 before Covid struck.

It means that in future, the science will be available to influence policymakers much faster, reducing the threat of the country grinding to a standstill. Even now, experts here are keeping tabs on new Covid variants, running tests to see how effective vaccines are and how long protection lasts.

But its remit goes way beyond Covid, with more than 200 scientists working on upwards of 100 projects. These include surveillance and potential vaccine development for diseases including HN51 bird flu, which kills close to 50 per cent of those it infects. 

Others are targeting tuberculosis and Clostridium difficile, a bacterial infection common in hospitals that can be deadly to the elderly.

Scientists say global migration is leading to rising threats as people and animals move closer together. Global warming is also creating risks of pathogens carried by vectors such as mosquitoes and ticks appearing in previously unheard-of places, including the UK.

Early clinical trials are taking place for what could be a world-first vaccine against Crimean-Congo haemorrhagic fever, a virus spread by tick bites, recently found in the nearby New Forest.

Professor Isabel Oliver, chief scientific officer at UKHSA, said: ‘We have seen a very large number of new infectious diseases in recent decades. There’s no doubt there will be new pandemics in the not-too-distant future. 

‘We know that through scientific advancement, we could detect and control these threats before they have the impact Covid-19 had on our lives.’

Health Secretary Steve Barclay said the centre ‘cements the UK’s global position spearheading pandemic preparedness, vaccine development and scientific discovery’. 

He added: ‘Hundreds of the world’s leading scientists are already in the centre working on vaccines… to save lives across the world.’

A new vaccine that appears to stop Alzheimer’s in its tracks is adding to optimism that this could be the beginning of the end for the disease.  

A study of the jab in mice found that not only did the shot clear harmful amyloid plaque from the brain, it also prevented the behavioral changes that normally plague Alzheimer’s sufferers.

It comes after a year in which two breakthrough drugs proved they could slow the disease, ending decades of failed trials and false hope. However, those treatments only give patients a few extra months of healthy life.

This vaccine could go even further in its ability to stop the disease – which affects at least 6million Americans – from progressing before it reaches a point of no return, researchers say.

Dr Chieh-Lun Hsiao, a cardiovascular researcher at Japan’s Juntendo, said: ‘If the vaccine could be successful in humans, it would be a big step towards delaying disease progression or even prevention of this disease.’ 

The new study – which is still ongoing – involves testing the vaccine in mice who had mutated versions of an amyloid precursor protein inserted into their genes.

Amyloid plaques are a hallmark of Alzheimer’s and are believed to speed up the death of brain cells.

There is still some debate about whether they cause the disease or are a symptom of it.  

Some mice received a vaccine while others received a placebo. The vaccine given to mice at two and four months old was designed to target a specific molecule on the brain’s outer membrane of damaged or ‘senescent’ cells. 

That molecule is called senescence-associated glycoprotein (SAGP). 

By identifying this specific site on a cell, scientists can more precisely target the root cause of Alzheimers – in this case, the accumulation of toxic plaques – rather than just the symptoms such as cognitive decline. 

Once inserted into the mice, the vaccine effectively trained their immune system to recognize SAGP on the surface of damaged cells as a harmful foreign invader. 

After the immune system was primed to seek out SAGP, it mounted an attack against them, killing them off.

The vaccine effectively reduced SAGP and amyloid deposits in the mouse brains in the region responsible for language processes, attention, and problem solving. 

It showed other positive effects that suggest it could work in humans. When placed in a maze-type device to test the vaccine’s impact on behavior, the mice who received the SAGP vaccine tended to behave like normal healthy mice and exhibited more awareness of their surroundings.

Dr Hsiao said: ‘Alzheimer’s disease now accounts for 50% to 70% of dementia patients worldwide. Our study’s novel vaccine test in mice points to a potential way to prevent or modify the disease. The future challenge will be to achieve similar results in humans.’ 

He added: ‘Earlier studies using different vaccines to treat Alzheimer’s disease in mouse models have been successful in reducing amyloid plaque deposits and inflammatory factors, however, what makes our study different is that our SAGP vaccine also altered the behavior of these mice for the better.’ 

The Japanese team’s findings are still in their early phases and human trials could take years. But the research has received the backing of the influential American Heart Association. 

In healthy people, amyloid proteins are cleared from the brain. 

But in a brain afflicted by Alzheimer’s, the amyloid-beta protein deposits build up over time and form ‘sticky’ plaques in the brain.

When the buildup of amyloid in the brain reaches a tipping point, it leads to the formation of tangles of a protein called tau.

The formation of these tangles disrupts the normal functioning of brain cells by disrupting the transport of essential molecules such as neurotransmitters involved in intercellular communication and nutrients such as glucose and oxygen.

The research into the exact mechanisms that cause Alzheimer’s disease is ongoing and far from settled. Some researchers believe tau has a bigger role to play than amyloid plaques in the progression of the disease.

Over time, the buildup of plaques and tau tangles damages synapses in critical regions of the brain such as the hippocampus, for instance, which is crucial for forming memories, as well as the Entorhinal Cortex which relays sensory information from the outer cortex of the brain to the hippocampus.

That buildup also damages the parietal lobe of the brain involved closely with sensory perception, spatial awareness, and the ability to maintain attention.

Alzheimer’s disease is the most common form of dementia, accounting for 60 to 70 percent of all cases, according to the World Health Organization (WHO). 

So far, 2023 has been a banner year for Alzheimer’s research, with the advent of two of the most promising treatments in decades following years of failed trials and billions spent. 

Last month, the Food and Drug Administration took the much-anticipated step of approving a monoclonal antibody treatment for Alzheimer’s disease called Leqembi, which was shown to slow the pace of cognitive decline by 27 percent in early-stage patients.

The historic approval of Leqembi was followed by promising trial results of another treatment from Eli Lilly called donanemab which slowed disease progression by 35 percent.  

While the development of both treatments marks a major step forward in understanding the mechanisms by which Alzheimer’s robs a person of what it means to be themselves, they are not perfect. 

Slowed decline by 27 or even 35 percent really only equates to an extra four to eight months without extremely severe symptoms such as an inability to remember loved ones’ names, incontinence, or a loss of fine motor function. 

A vaccine, though, could stop Alzheimer’s in its tracks and even prevent the accumulation of plaques that kill off healthy brain cells to the point at which they cannot communicate with each other, leading to problems with memory and reasoning.  

Ex-head of Government’s vaccine taskforce Kate Bingham warns UK is unprepared for Covid 2.0 because of ‘dumbarse’ decisions in wake of the pandemic

By Richard Marsden

Updated: 07:42 EDT, 29 July 2023

Did vaccine scientist ‘thrown to his death’ have proof of Wuhan lab leak? Chinese military expert who filed patent for Covid vaccine barely a month into country’s first lockdown died in mysterious circumstances aged just 54

•  Zhou Yusen filed a patent for a Covid-19 vaccine on February 24, 2020
• This was barely a month after Wuhan locked down due to the outbreak 
• It is said that ‘Zhou fell from the roof of the Institute’, but this is not confirmed

By Glen Owen

Published: 12:11 EDT, 17 June 2023 | Updated: 20:58 EDT, 17 June 2023