The spray is called "Pathogen Capture and Neutralizing Spray" (PCANS) for now
This data suggest PCANS as a promising daily-use prophylactic against respiratory infections.
The study is paywalled, and the abstract doesn't list its ingredients beyond
The formulation consists of excipients identified from the FDA's Inactive Ingredient Database and Generally Recognized as Safe list to maximize efficacy for each step in the multi-modal approach.
Based on that description, its ingredients might not be very different from Covixyl, though it claims to be much more effective.
Edit: Apparently its already for sale, I included some details in a comment
This is a pre-print for a study that was done with mice. I love y'all, but don't go replacing your normal precautions with untested alternatives just yet.
Edit: I was shocked that no one else was able to read the full text of the article yet I could. I guess that Bypass Paywall for Firefox is damn good. The best I could do for you all is a copy-paste job because the website won't let me print out a PDF or anything.
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Oof yeah this is pretty early in development. I do like the 100% survival rate in their experimental group vs 0% survival in the control group, it seems like it might have some potential.
You can get pretty good at designing studies that end up giving you results like that
Why didn't they mention this in my bs research ethic course :(
If it's anything like Covid tests, we'll be lucky to get 3 of them for a period of 2 years
Paywalled scientific studies are cursed. Also, don't get your hopes up, you can probably accomplish the same thing with a saline gel nasal spray you can get for 5 bucks at the drugstore.
Edit: Sorry for being so dismissive initially.
I don't know how saline gel nasal sprays compare, but of existing nasal sprays, carrageenan (80% risk reduction)
> hypromellose (78% risk reduction) > nitric oxide (75% risk reduction)> xylitol (62% risk reduction) according to the Clean Air Club, so nasal sprays aren't all just the same thing.In case people want to look at the studies being cited. The carrageenan and xylitol studies actually have placebo groups.
The hypromellose study is really bad, run by the CEO and VP of the company producing the product. Saying things like:
To our knowledge this is the first time that any measure to prevent infection in SARS-CoV-2 virus was proven effective beyond the use of masks.
D Megiddo is the CEO of Nasus Pharma, the manufacturer of Taffix. T Lapidot is the VP clinical of Nasus Pharma, the manufacturer of Taffix.
Both the hypromellose and nitric oxide studies relied on people administering it themselves and had no placebo groups. Basically the people who volunteered to take and use (self-reporting as well, instead of being administered by the researchers) the products are the same people who were already washing their hands, masking, etc.
Honestly I was pretty surprised with the carrageenan study, seems worthwhile.
These other studies on carrageenan are incredibly dense, which is a good sign, but I also can't really go through them thoroughly in any reasonable amount of time, but this stuff seems very good.
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3001860/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC8709357/#B35-ijms-22-13202
Coming in with the anecdotes, but I've done a public facing job with often just the carrageenan spray as prevention in small unventilated spaces face to face with clients for 6 months now and never got sick from work.
I did get covid, but from family via my partner at home.
The last time I had to spend an hour with a visibly sick person was at the start of this week and so far so good. Might be immunity too from having just had covid a little over a month ago though. I wish masking was ok in my work, but it's not.
But considering how high risk my work is and how all my co-workers sure are sick all the time and I'm not, it makes me think the spray might at least be helping. I also avoid gatherings and have an air purifier on my desk, I also don't people on my freetime. So there are many reasons for this as well.
so, simple question, what the hell is a nasal spray and how is it supposed to protect you from viruses?
Gel sprays basically do the same thing your own snot is doing. Physically catch and trap particles/viruses and stop them from entering your body.
The saline gel spray I was talking about would just be a physical barrier, but the other ones we were talking about have some ingredient to actively kill viruses on top of being a barrier.
so it's enhanced snot.
ultrasnot
H Y P E R S N O T
that's pretty sick, science is cool
Apparently the company calls it Profi and it's already for sale for
$25 per bottle
but with a 15-25% discount if you do a subscription instead of a 1-time purchase. The amount of discount depends on how frequent your subscription is, though maybe you can just choose the most often one and cancel immediately anyway
Its ingredient list: pectin, gellan, phenylethyl alcohol, polysorbate 80, benzalkonium chloride, purified water
They say that it can be used up to 3 times per day but that there should be at least a 4-hour gap between uses
Their site's Read the Science link takes you to the paywalled paper
The paper looks to be a pure theory paper that contains no information on human trials. It's frankly bizarre that they're already selling this, and I'd recommend not buying it until it has passed human trials.
There's no active ingredients, this is just a nasal gel. Just like we don't do trials on a new brand of bandaid, this doesn't need trials.
I’d certainly like some trials proving its effectiveness in humans at preventing covid, preferably compared to the other nasal sprays that we do have human trials for
Their site's Read the Science link takes you to the paywalled paper
Lmao
"Read the science"
"Well, observe the existence of science behind this wall, anyway"
"subscription"
Who ever spoke this word first should be in the lowest layer of hell.
Sorry to be a stick in the mud, but pls wait for human studies before changing your habits.
Science emphasizes being a stick in the mud before darting off with untested, un-reviewed bs. Source: I remember all that 'room temp superconductor' bullshit running around a couple months ago only for that supposed data to be totally unable to be replicated.
Iota-carageenan based sprays operate on the same principle. Basically coats your nasal passage with a gel that traps virus, bacteria, and allergens.
The one I use helps with allergies so it's doing something, and I convinced someone I know who works in small office and got pressured out of masking at work (plus they couldn't find a mask that works with their glasses), and they run an air filter + nasal sprays like covixyl and betadine, along with yearly vaccines, and they haven't gotten sick in over a year.
But I've also read enough anecdotal reports from people who use them and still got sick with covid. Who knows if they were properly applied, but I doubt these sprays alone will do much if your exposure levels are high.
Still iI think t's probably worth trying to protect your olfactory bulb with these sprays, since that's at least one of the ways they think covid can enter the brain.
plus they couldn't find a mask that works with their glasses
Most KN95s and all N95s I have tried fog my glasses. But ProGear N95s don't, that's the kind that I prefer. Once you put it on, you can press the metal nose band to fit it to your exact nose shape
But I've also read enough anecdotal reports from people who use them and still got sick with covid. Who knows if they were properly applied,
Maybe it's important to get one with a good spray. The Betadine iota carrageenan spray is very good, with respect to diffusion. It also doesn't require shaking or spraying beforehand to get a full spray.
Some Covixyl bottles don't diffuse the spray well, and it's very noticeable
but I doubt these sprays alone will do much if your exposure levels are high.
And if there's enough COVID in the air, you can get COVID in your eyes, not just your nose. Wearing Stoggles helps if someone coughs in your direction, but not if there's just lots of COVID in the air
I understand this is neat and all but the one thing I never see mentioned is how on earth I am to believe this is all going to be more accessible to the average person than a box of 400 N95s on Amazon for 100 bucks (often even cheaper and not-from-Amazon if you shop around) — or a local mask bloc helping for free.
We already have access to all the tools and methods we need to end the pandemic right now if we really wanted to — and I genuinely mean this. China proved it. New Zealand proved it. These very same methods are likely to be far, far more accessible to most everyone than whatever hot new panacea that may or may not even come, and we won’t do them, especially not after however long it’s been now of people not giving a shit anymore. They ended all the welfare programs that benefited everyone even seeking treatment or prevention to begin with and most insurances do not cover vaccinations for Covid anymore. Why would this be any different? Will they give this to everyone for free when it’s ready and it cures/gives total immunity to Covid? In five years? Ten? They don’t do it now.
I don’t want to disparage genuine scientific efforts, that is not my intent at all, but the excitement for things like this imo seems to stem not from a desire for accessibility or justice but from a desire for comfort and complacency — i.e. no one masks anyway, might as well do what appeals to them instead of advocate militantly for what should be done — and that just really bums me out. The people most clamoring for the magic pill or shot or spray are the ones also clamoring for 2019 the most. 2019 is dead and it is not coming back.
i.e. no one masks anyway, might as well do what appeals to them instead of advocate militantly for what should be done — and that just really bums me out.
I think that's that's the target audience, people who can't or won't mask. My parents won't mask when out of the house unless I'm there watching them, for example, and sometimes not even then. If your job won't let you mask or makes it difficult, nasal sprays can help in that case, too.
For maskers like myself, it's particularly useful in airport security, where they make me take off my mask for identification, and airport terminals and airplanes, where I might want to eat but there's a lot of other people around.
