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SARS-CoV-2 Vaccines and the Growing Threat of Viral Variants

Educational Objective
To identify the key insights or developments described in this article
1 Credit CME

In November 2019, a bat coronavirus made its debut in the human population. Since that time, the virus has continued to adapt, resulting in a series of viral variants. The question that the world faces in early 2021 is whether these new variants will escape recognition by vaccine-induced immunity.

Protection against coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) is mediated in large part by an immune response directed against the severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2) spike (S)-protein. The S-protein is responsible for virus-cell binding and is the target for virus-neutralizing antibodies (NAbs). Although this is not strictly proven, most vaccine researchers believe that NAbs induced by vaccination are protective against COVID-19. NAbs bind to the S-protein at a few sites, usually in or near the receptor-binding domain (RBD); in doing so, NAbs prevent the virus from attaching to the ACE2 receptor on human cells.

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Article Information

Corresponding Author: Paul A. Offit, MD, Division of Infectious Diseases, Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia, Perelman School of Medicine, University of Pennsylvania, 34th St & Civic Center Blvd, ARB, Room 1202C, Philadelphia, PA 19104-4399 (offit@email.chop.edu).

Published Online: January 28, 2021. doi:10.1001/jama.2021.1114

Conflict of Interest Disclosures: None reported.

Editor’s Note: Although preprints are rarely included as references in JAMA articles, in the midst of the COVID-19 pandemic some of the information in this article is based on rapidly developing and emerging science that is only available as preliminary communications on preprint servers.

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Credit Designation Statement: The American Medical Association designates this Journal-based CME activity activity for a maximum of 1.00  AMA PRA Category 1 Credit(s)™. Physicians should claim only the credit commensurate with the extent of their participation in the activity.

Successful completion of this CME activity, which includes participation in the evaluation component, enables the participant to earn up to:

  • 1.00 Medical Knowledge MOC points in the American Board of Internal Medicine's (ABIM) Maintenance of Certification (MOC) program;;
  • 1.00 Self-Assessment points in the American Board of Otolaryngology – Head and Neck Surgery’s (ABOHNS) Continuing Certification program;
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  • 1.00 Lifelong Learning points in the American Board of Pathology’s (ABPath) Continuing Certification program; and
  • 1.00 credit toward the CME of the American Board of Surgery’s Continuous Certification program

It is the CME activity provider's responsibility to submit participant completion information to ACCME for the purpose of granting MOC credit.

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