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So much comparing 
in discussing 'rescue therapy' for human challenge trials. You can find a fulminant syndrome in ID textbooks with no simple 'rescue therapy' for most challenge pathogens (approx participant no. in blue). Yet these trials have an excellent safety record.
in discussing 'rescue therapy' for human challenge trials. You can find a fulminant syndrome in ID textbooks with no simple 'rescue therapy' for most challenge pathogens (approx participant no. in blue). Yet these trials have an excellent safety record.
...because there's a huge effort to keep participants safe, by design. If investigators can't convince themselves & plenty of others, the trial won't happen.
Consider 'my' challenge pathogen, #StrepA aka Streptococcus pyogenes - beyond 'strep throat' causes severe invasive acute infections (e.g. necrotising fasciitis), delayed immune complications (APSGN, ARF), and chronic disease (RHD).
Antibiotics kill #StrepA but don't magically 'rescue' someone from nec fasc, toxic shock, ARF, RHD... So we had to think very hard about the strain we'd use in our pharyngitis human infection study... https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/30760615/
...and the protocol... https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/31101422/
A #SARSCoV2 human challenge may or may not ultimately be required, but 'rescue therapy' is not the biggest part of the safety story. Beyond sensationalist headlines & hot takes, this is serious science by serious scientists who take safety seriously.
