Coronavirus: Would you volunteer to be exposed? These Stanford grads did

If vaccine testing could be trimmed by just one day, potentially saving thousands of lives, would you volunteer to be exposed to the COVID-19 virus?

Yes, say a growing number of young, healthy and informed people. In less than a month, more than 3,300 people from 52 nations — including at least two Stanford grads — have signed up to be deliberately exposed to the new virus in a campaign organized by the nonprofit 1DaySooner, a willingness that’s caught the attention of legislators, ethicists and scientists.

The effort was launched by Josh Morrison of Brooklyn, N.Y., a Harvard-educated attorney who founded Waitlist Zero, a nonprofit that seeks to ease kidney donation. In 2011, he donated a kidney to a stranger, accepting a small risk of death to save a life. A readily available COVID-19 vaccine, he reasoned, could save far more lives.

Josh Morrison, 34, is the founder of 1DaySooner, which enlists volunteers to participate in COVID-19 “human challenge” vaccine trials. He donated his kidney to a stranger. 

Traditionally, a vaccine is proven effective after comparison of cases in hundreds or thousands of individuals who randomly receive vaccine or placebo. That process takes a long time, because it must wait for natural infection.

The premise of a “human challenge” study is to infect a smaller number of vaccinated people who are young and healthy, accelerating testing and giving manufacturing a head start. A challenge study takes advantage of the low 0.2% death rate of COVID-19 in 18–45 year olds — not negligible, but very uncommon.

Such studies put volunteers at potential risk of disease and death.  There is no “rescue” therapy to treat them, if they get sick. The long-term effects are unknown.  Yet they’re willing to help anyway.

Who are these people? We interviewed two Stanford-educated volunteers. They explain their motivation, in their own words:

Sophie Rose, 22, of Brisbane, Australia. Her undergraduate degree is in Biology, with an emphasis on infectious disease epidemiology. She is an incoming graduate fellow at Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health in Baltimore.

Vaccine volunteer Sophie Rose, 22, is a Stanford graduate who will study infectious disease epidemiology at the Johns Hopkins School of Public Health. 

“The widespread suffering and loss of life we’re seeing, as well as the sustained damage to national economies, international relations, and societal stability — it’s severe enough that any meaningful reduction in that damage could drastically improve the health and well-being of so many people.

I’m interested in volunteering for a challenge trial because it seems like an option with the potential to reduce the extent of that damage, through accelerating vaccine development or manufacturing.

I’m in a position to be able to take on that risk—why not me?

I believe the individual risk to me personally is fairly low — I am young, have no underlying health conditions, don’t smoke, etc. The data we’re seeing from China and the United States so far seems to indicate that my risk of moderate or severe disease if I were to become infected with COVID-19 corroborates that intuition.

That being said, the risk of getting extremely sick is certainly something I’ve considered carefully, and am okay with because of the access to medical care volunteers would be afforded.  My parents are both wonderfully altruistic people, so they empathize with my desire to participate in a trial that could help a lot of people. Of course, they’re still my parents, and I’m sure they worry about me taking on that risk. I imagine it will be an ongoing conversation!”

Carson Poltorack, 23, of Fort Lauderdale, Florida. His undergraduate degree is in Biology, with an emphasis on molecular biology. He is interested in oncology and conducted research on small cell lung cancer in the lab of Stanford professor Julien Sage. He is an incoming MD/PhD student at the University of Pennsylvania in Philadelphia.

Vaccine volunteer Carson Poltorack, 23, is a Stanford graduate who will earn dual MD/PhD degrees at the University of Pennsylvania. (Karl Mondon/Bay Area News Group) 

“To me, it seemed so obvious. It’s a staggering amount of benefit for what is ultimately a pretty minor sacrifice, in the grand scheme of things.

Critics ask: ‘How can anyone give “informed consent” to be infected with this virus when we still don’t know exactly what the long term health outcomes are, possibly years down the road?

What that argument totally misses is that 2.5 million people are getting infected without getting consent.  None of these people asked to be infected. To me, it is far more preferable to have a small proportion of concerned individuals be infected, if it can minimize the broader social impact.

The pandemic feels surreal. It’s really hard to grasp the scale… I was feeling so powerless, just sitting in my room. I wanted to be doing something to make this better.

Yes, it is a huge sacrifice. It should be honored, not discouraged. Sacrificing your time and your health is one of the most powerful things that someone can do.

I’ve made peace with it. I’m not stoked about it. If there is a better way to reduce fatalities, sign me up. I’d be glad to do it in a different or better way.

If it accelerates vaccine development by a month, that prevents hundreds of thousands of infections, saving lives. The math works out.”

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Learn more:

“Human Challenge Studies to Accelerate Coronavirus Vaccine Licensure” by Nir Eyal, Marc Lipsitch, Peter G Smith in The Journal of Infectious Diseases, March 31, 2020

“Extraordinary diseases require extraordinary solutions” by Stanley A. Plotkin and Arthur Caplan in Vaccine, April 20, 2020

“Covid Challenge,” 1DaySooner.org

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