- The photo of a canine coronavirus vaccine circulated on Facebook, fueling conspiracy theories.
- The families of coronaviruses that infect dogs and cats have nothing in common with Covid-19 and therefore cannot be of use in vaccine research.
- Studies on the avian virus, however, are underway in Israel. Scientists are putting the scope of this research into perspective for the time being.
“2001 pet coronavirus vaccine… something is wrong. Accompanied by this comment on Facebook, the publication of a photo of a bottle with a label on which one can read "Canine coronavirus vaccine" went viral before being deleted this Thursday.
There is an address on the label: "Intervet Inc., Omaha, Ne [Nebraska] 68103 USA".
This image, which was viewed 35,000 times Wednesday, has sown doubt among Internet users, who commented: "It smells of russets", "Finally, what is this coronavirus? "," I followed a debate today where they were talking about the existence of the virus in poultry. They are doing research to adapt the vaccine to men. "
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The address provided is that of Merck Animal Health, a company that develops, manufactures and markets a range of veterinary drugs and services. This type of vaccine does exist, as found on the Zoetis website, an American veterinary pharmaceutical company, which markets a product "recommended for the vaccination of healthy dogs six weeks of age or older to help prevent gastric canine coronaviral enteritis ”.
In dogs, coronavirus disease was known long before the Covid-19 epidemic. It results in gastroenteritis accompanied by severe diarrhea. "But the vaccine is not compulsory in France, it is not recommended by the Wsava [Global Veterinay Community]", specifies to 20 Minutes Christophe Buhot, of Snel, professional organization representative of veterinarians of liberal exercise. “Each animal species has its coronavirus (dogs, cats, pigs, ruminants, dromedaries, birds, bats). The term coronavirus is very general, it's like talking about a Bordeaux wine ”, continues the practitioner.
Avian coronavirus research
"Coroc (canine coronavirus) and Corof (feline coronavirus) are digestive viruses that are found in fecal secretions, also explains Cristina Cardone, veterinarian, on medisite.fr. There is no form of canine and feline coronavirus common to Covid-19. "
And since the viruses are not the same, the vaccine that exists for animals is of no use in the search for a vaccine for humans. "There is no evidence that the dog vaccine could work for humans," says Christophe Buhot. If there were any kinship between the two viruses, the laboratories would already be studying this possibility. "
What about research mentioned by a user to adapt a vaccine to men based on a virus that affects poultry? On February 27, an Israeli laboratory indicated in a press release that it had been working for four years on a vaccine on the coronavirus of avian infectious bronchitis: "We found that the avian coronavirus had a great genetic similarity with human Covid-19, and that it uses the same mechanism of infection, a fact that increases the likelihood of finding an effective human vaccine in a short time. Alexandre Bleibtreu, infectious disease specialist at Pitié-Salpêtrière, nevertheless put things into perspective on the Liberation site :“You have to differentiate between a vaccine candidate and an effective vaccine. There are many steps to validate by then. "
" There are a lot of laboratories that are currently developing vaccines", also nuanced Isabelle Imbert, professor-researcher of the Architecture and Function of Biological Macromolecules laboratory at the University of Aix-Marseille and specialist in coronavirus, who concludes: "We has passed the prevention stage. We are no longer vaccinating people. The urgency is to develop antivirals to help the body block the progression of the virus. "
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