Savvy Updates, 8/31/20: Inverse Vaccine to Cure T1D, T1D/T2D Associated with Covid-19 related mortality

Curing Type 1 Diabetes with an ‘Inverse Vaccine’ was reported by Sara Seitz for InsulinNation.com, 25 August 2020. She writes that, “A new vaccine that retrains the immune system may hold the key to curing diabetes in those with remaining beta cell function.”

Researchers from the Leiden University Medical Center in the Netherlands were able to create this “inverse vaccine” of specialized dendritic cells by taking a blood sample and isolating certain white blood cells destined to become dendritic immune cells. By growing these cells in the lab using a bath with a high vitamin D3 concentration, the scientists were able to create anti-inflammatory dendrites. While dendritic cells grown without D3 become inflammatory and are used to train the immune system to attack, these anti-inflammatory cells have the opposite effect; they train the T cells of the immune system what not to attack.

Before these cells are injected back into the patient, they are treated with a fragment of proinsulin. Once in the body, these specialized dendritic cells with proinsulin attached to their cell surface act as a vaccine, but in reverse; instead of teaching the immune system to react to proinsulin, they teach it to stop attacking it.

This new ‘inverse vaccine’ involves the use of anti-inflammatory dendritic cells with the potential to retrain the immune system to be less reactive toward insulin-producing beta cells. If it works, it could provide a therapy option for newly diagnosed patients to halt or even prevent the progression of the disease.

As reported in The Lancet/Diabetes & Endocrinology, Associations of type 1 and type 2 diabetes with COVID-19-related mortality in England: a whole-population study was released on 13 August 2020.

BOTTOM LINE for those with T1D and T2D … do your darnedest to avoid contact or contracting Covid-19.

A whole-population study was conducted to assess risks of in-hospital death with COVID-19 between March 1 and May 11, 2020. We included all individuals registered with a general practice in England who were alive on Feb 16, 2020. We used multivariable logistic regression to examine the effect of diabetes status, by type, on in-hospital death with COVID-19, adjusting for demographic factors and cardiovascular comorbidities. The results of this nationwide analysis in England show that type 1 and type 2 diabetes were both independently associated with a significant increased odds of in-hospital death with COVID-19.

Interpretation: The results of this nationwide analysis in England show that type 1 and type 2 diabetes were both independently associated with a significant increased odds of in-hospital death with COVID-19.

This study did not receive any funding, no built in bias.