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Vaccine testing in monkeys often is a prerequisite for human studies. A team from Harvard inoculated nine rhesus macaque monkeys with SARS-CoV-2: High viral loads were found in the monkeys' upper and lower respiratory tracts (with lower loads in the gut, liver, and kidney), and virus-specific humoral and cellular immune responses developed. The monkeys developed pathologically confirmed pneumonia (although they exhibited minimal respiratory symptoms); none died. On rechallenge with the virus, viral loads in the respiratory tract were exponentially lower than on initial challenge, indicating that initial natural protective immunity had developed.
The team then produced several different DNA vaccines: DNA that encoded various SARS-CoV-2 spike …