Coronaviruses range from colds to worse infections such as SARS (SARS-CoV) and MERS (MERS-CoV) and the current Covid-19 (SARS-CoV-2). There is still no FDA-approved vaccine to prevent coronavirus infections. Both have permission for FDA emergency use.
Two of the Covid-19 vaccines available in the US use messenger RNA technology to prevent or reduce the symptoms of Covid-19 infection. This mRNA vaccine technology is new; the effects of altered DNA, if any, are unknown. However, others, including the CDC, have said that the virus will not interact with DNA.
Other scientists believe that mRNA vaccines can penetrate DNA and change it permanently. Like DNA vaccines, RNA vaccines use part of the genetic code of the virus to make the immune system react.
An article currently in preprint (not yet peer-reviewed) discusses a laboratory study in which some pieces of Covid-19 RNA were converted into DNA and then integrated into human chromosomes.
Medical Daily spoke to lead author Rudolf Jaenisch, managing director. A professor of biology at MIT, dr. Jaenisch, conducted the first experiment that proved that genetic defects in rodents could be corrected. He is currently dealing with Parkinson’s, Alzheimer’s, autism and cancer in humans. He has won numerous awards for his work, including the Wolf Prize in Medicine.
MD: Does your recent study indicate that Covid-19 mRNA vaccines can damage DNA in humans?
Dr. Jaenisch: Not really evidence of harm. The mRNA can integrate into the DNA and possibly be expressed, but there is no direct evidence of this.
MD: What could it mean for the future if the mRNA vaccines could integrate into human DNA?
Dr. Jaenisch: It will be breakthrough technology. This will change the way diseases are treated.
MD: How will mRNA or DNA vaccines change treatments?
Dr. Jaenisch: These mRNA Covid-19 vaccines are the first to demonstrate the safety and efficacy of this type of therapy. If there is sufficient evidence that this technology is safe and effective, it has great potential for future therapies for the treatment of many diseases.
The work of the Jaenisch Laboratory may also explain why patients who recovered after Covid-19 are still positive for the disease even months later, according to an ABC news report. If the virus alters the DNA of these patients, its genetic information may still be active. The Jaenisch laboratory found that the virus used an enzyme called LINE-1 to re-enter the cell to replicate. LINE-1 is readily available in the human genome.
Dr. Jaenisch thinks it might be a good thing or mRNA vaccines can alter DNA. He also believes that this new technology is making the breakthrough for breakthrough treatments for many diseases that affect people. Since Dr. Jaenisch has been studying DNA in cancer and neurological diseases for decades, which is probably more than most of us know.
Yvonne Stolworthy MSN, RN studied at the nursing school in 1984 and spent many years in critical care and as an educator in a variety of environments, including clinical trials.