WASHINGTON — US researchers have opened another safety test of an experimental COVID-19 vaccine, this one using a skin-deep shot instead of the usual deeper jab.
“It’s the most important trial that we’ve ever done,” Dr. John Ervin of the Center for Pharmaceutical Research told The Associated Press afterward. “People are beating down the door to get into this trial.”
The experiment, using a vaccine candidate developed by Inovio Pharmaceuticals, is part of a global hunt for much-needed protection against a virus that has triggered an economic shutdown and forced people indoors as countries try to stem the spread.
Inovio researchers packaged a section of the virus’ genetic code inside a piece of synthetic DNA. Injected as a vaccine, the cells act as a mini-factory to produce harmless protein copies. The immune system makes protective antibodies against them — primed if the real virus ever comes along.
Inovio research and development chief Kate Broderick likens it to giving the body an FBI wanted poster so it can recognize the enemy.
But after the skin-deep injection, researchers must hold a device over the spot that gives a little electrical zap. The synthetic DNA is large when it comes to penetrating human cells, and the pulse helps the vaccine more easily penetrate and get to work, Broderick said.

DNA vaccines are a new technology. But Inovio has experimental vaccines against other diseases that are made the same way that have passed initial safety testing.
Hate to be a loony paranoid conspiracy nut, a crank, or a total wet blanket about this, I really, truly do, but…a shallowly-implanted “vaccine” that must be activated electronically? Gee, THAT doesn’t give off a creepy, Big-Brotherish sort of vibe at all. Wonder what else that eensy-weensy, totally benign, harmless “little zap” might be activating in there?
Reminder: I am NOT a doctor, know little to nothing about this sort of thing, and freely confess to being most likely full of crap here. Also, I am not, nor have I ever been, any kind of “anti-vaxxer.” But based on the information above, along with my own knowledge of what the US government truly is and is not nowadays, I can’t honestly say I’d be completely at ease with being given a “vaccine” like this, either. Or required by law to take one.
I’m not bothered by the electronic zap. Just a jolt of stimulation.
One of the problems with vaccines is to make sure they work thoroughly and don’t leave the super duper little bugs to mutate into more super duper ones. I think that is one of the reasons testing takes so long.