Vaccinology in the post-COVID-19 era

Rino Rappuoli; Ennio De Gregorio; Giuseppe Del Giudice; Sanjay Phogat; Simone Pecetta; Mariagrazia Pizza; Emmanuel Hanon

doi:10.1073/pnas.2020368118

Vaccinology in the post-COVID-19 era

Proc Natl Acad Sci U S A. 2021 Jan 19;118(3):e2020368118. doi: 10.1073/pnas.2020368118.

Authors

Rino Rappuoli¹, Ennio De Gregorio², Giuseppe Del Giudice², Sanjay Phogat², Simone Pecetta², Mariagrazia Pizza², Emmanuel Hanon³

Affiliations

¹ Research and Development Centre, GlaxoSmithKline (GSK), 53100 Siena, Italy; rino.r.rappuoli@gsk.com.
² Research and Development Centre, GlaxoSmithKline (GSK), 53100 Siena, Italy.
³ Research and Development Centre, GlaxoSmithKline (GSK), 1330 Rixensart, Belgium.

Abstract

The COVID-19 pandemic is a shocking reminder of how our world would look in the absence of vaccination. Fortunately, new technologies, the pace of understanding new and existing pathogens, and the increased knowledge of the immune system allow us today to develop vaccines at an unprecedented speed. Some of the vaccine technologies that are fast-tracked by the urgency of COVID-19 may also be the answer for other health priorities, such as antimicrobial resistance, chronic infections, and cancer, that the post-COVID-19 world will urgently need to face. This perspective analyzes the way COVID-19 is transforming vaccinology and the opportunities for vaccines to have an increasingly important role in health and well-being.

Keywords: COVID-19; vaccines; vaccinology.

MeSH terms

COVID-19 / epidemiology*
Humans
Pandemics*
SARS-CoV-2*
Vaccination / trends*
Vaccines* / immunology
Vaccines* / therapeutic use
Vaccinology / trends*

Substances

Vaccines