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Flu Vaccines and COVID-19

Meakins-Christie Laboratories COVID study and story

In a recent interview with Radio Canada’s Renaud Manuguerra-Gagné, Dr. Maziar Divangahi of the Meakins-Christie Laboratories explains how the flu vaccine can help our immune system to fight the COVID-19 virus.

Dr. Divangahi, having extensively researched the topic of immunity, has explored the subject of flu vaccines and COVID-19. In this interview he explains how the flu vaccine could train the innate immunity of an individual by causing it to increase the number of antiviral molecules, or cytokines, in the body. These cytokines may also help the body fight new, unrelated, infections, such as the SARS-CoV-2 virus, impeding the spread of the virus in the initial stages of infection. Trained immunity may also reduce the body’s extreme reaction to the virus in the later stages of infection; and it is these extreme reactions that results in the need for hospitalization.

Additional and more extensive research is needed to determine which vaccines will help fight a SARS-CoV-2 virus infection; whether or not a vaccine would be effective depends on what components it is composed of. This is promising news to read and will hopefully lead to exciting new discoveries in the near future.

Read the full article and interview here:

Les vaccins contre la grippe peuvent-ils réduire les symptômes de la COVID-19?, Renaud Manuguerra-Gagné, Radio-Canada, Montreal, February 15, 2021. Photo credit: Radio-Canada / Jeff McIntosh