Thread by @MonicaGandhi9

How long will immunity from COVID-19 vaccine last? Let's remember from papers tweeted before, immunity from natural infection & vaccinations across viruses lasts long. Remember: survivors of 1918 flu: memory B cells can stimulate Abs to fight same strain
nature.com/articles/natur…

Then immunity from pertussis, measles vaccinations lasts long long time - look at those T-cells (CD4 and CD8) from measles vaccination continue strong, measured out to 34 years after vaccination
ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/P…

Then let's turn to the RNA viruses that are coronaviruses (influenza, measles both RNA viruses too). There are coronaviruses that cause colds (229E, NL63, OC43, HKU1) for instance & coronaviruses (SARS-CoV-1, MERS) that - like SARS-CoV-2 cause more severe symptoms. Behooves us to

compare durability of SARS-CoV-2 to its dangerous cousins that caused SARS and MERS epidemics, respectively. Before that, I have to convince you that adaptive immunity comprises two types of responses - antibodies & T cells and latter more enduring after vaccination (or natural)

EXCELLENT review on this from December 2020. Mark following words when we talk of yellow fever vax later: "Data from coronavirus infections in animals and humans emphasize the generation of a high-quality T cell response in protective immunity"
sciencedirect.com/science/articl…

"Yellow Fever and smallpox vaccines are excellent benchmarks for primary immune response to viral vaccination and induce long-lived virus-reactive CD8 T-cells, which are present and measurable within 1–4 months of vaccination".
sciencedirect.com/science/articl…

Okay, so when scientists say MERS pandemic in 2011 and were looking to develop vaccine, they looked back to SARS-CoV (initial SARS) pandemic 2002-2003 and saw that cytotoxic and other T-cell responses after natural infection to SARS lasted long (>10 years)
sciencedirect.com/science/articl…

So, let's turn to SARS-CoV-2 and remember that we have plenty of evidence now that T-cell immunity induced by both natural infection (see below figure) and by the vaccines (see that table I tweet out on what T-cell responses were measured in the clinical trials of vaccines)

Now, let's turn to this paper to answer - but okay, how long? How long will immunity from natural infection & vaccines last? Let's remember yellow fever vaccination as a one-time vaccine usually over a lifetime as we answer.
science.sciencemag.org/content/371/65…

My favorite paper of pandemic above assessed immune memory of all 3 branches of adaptive immunity among 188 (80 male; 108 female) patients recovered from COVID-19 (93% mild; 7% hospitalized) over 8 months. Longitudinal samples assessed circulating antibodies, memory B cells,

CD8+ T cells, and CD4+ T cells specific for SARS-CoV-2 over 8 months. Happily, memory B cells specific for the spike protein or receptor binding domain (RBD) were detected in almost all COVID-19 cases, with NO apparent half-life (didn't decrease) at 5 to 8 months post-infection.

Memory T cell half-lives also long, observed over 6 months in this cohort (~125-225 days for CD8+ and ~94-153 days for CD4+ T cells), comparable to the 123 days half-life observed for memory CD8+ T cells after yellow fever immunization (a vaccine usually given once a lifetime).

Antibodies against spike protein and RBD also durable x 8 months, with modest declines over time. Conclusion: This longitudinal & comprehensive analysis of memory T and B cell responses to COVID-19 after infection was heartening in term of the likely durability of immune memory

after either natural infection or vaccination for COVID. If we can believe the B cell & T cell half-life data (and why wouldn't we? This group has been doing careful work since beginning), vaccine-induced immunity may last a lifetime or at least (initial SARS-CoV data)>10 years

@threadreaderapp please unroll
See you all in 3 days after CROI!

Another intriguing article to add on to why immunity likely to be long-lived with #covid19 vaccines. Remember long-lived memory B & T cells are stored in germinal centers (like lymph nodes) in our body & generate responses to fight the virus if see again
researchsquare.com/article/rs-310…

32 individuals who received 2 doses of Pfizer vaccine. Antibodies peaked and declined. But you store your long-term memory cells in "germinal centers" and they biopsied those centers (lymph nodes) & found GC B cells that bind spike protein in all participants sampled after vax.

Extremely high frequencies of spike protein binding GC B cells were maintained in draining lymph nodes for up to seven weeks after first vaccine shot, with a substantial fraction of the plasmablast pool class switched to IgA (which protects us against nasal mucosal colonization)

Wanted to keep adding to thread of "how long will immunity last to COVID vaccine" as find more articles. This one shows us that T cells against the nucleocapsid protein with SARS-CoV (SARS epidemic 2002-03) strong at 17 years, immunity to COVID likely long
nature.com/articles/s4158…