Since the 1960s, scientists have known coronaviruses live among us, attacking in waves year after year. Coronavirus is just one of the many viruses that cause the common cold and accounts for up to 26% of all upper respiratory tract infections in adults. However, these infections rarely cause death, and for decades, a coronavirus vaccine wasn’t a high priority. However, COVID changed that, so dozens of nonprofits, government agencies, and vaccine makers are working to develop a single, universal vaccine that will protect against all coronavirus variants.
According to a new study in Science Translational Medicine, a team of English researchers might have discovered how to accomplish this. Based out of the Francis Crick Institute, the team has identified a specific area of the SARS-CoV-2 spike protein that offers protection against the new variants of SARS-CoV-2 as well as the relatively harmless cold-causing strains.