Debunked: 2017 patent refers to mRNA vaccines as "agents of biowarfare". (It actually refers to using vaccines to treat people exposed to such agents)

Trailblazer

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A claim is circulating on social media that a vaccine patent was granted in 2017, which describes the vaccine as an "agent of biowarfare". In some cases the patent is specifically stated to relate to mRNA vaccines.

Examples:

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In fact this is pretty easy to debunk by simply reading the patent - even the short excerpt included in this tweet.

The patent in question is US 9,539,210. It describes "vaccine nanocarriers capable of stimulating an immune response in T cells and/or B cells".
A nanocarrier is simply a very small (nano) material used to carry a drug into the body: typically any particle less than 100 nanometres in size would qualify. Using nanocarriers to carry vaccines can, according to the patent authors, improve the immune response from a vaccine and reduce the amount of vaccine that is required to be effective.

In common with many patents, the authors try to cover as many possible applications of the general idea as they can. They suggest many possible compositions for the vaccine/nanocarrier combination, and many possible pathogens that the vaccines could be used against.

So where does the claim about vaccines being described as "agents of biowarfare" or "chemical weapons" come from? Searching the patent text for those phrases we find this:


In some aspects, a composition comprising a nanocarrier comprising a small molecule, an immunostimulatory agent, and a T cell antigen is provided. In some embodiments, the small molecule is on the surface of the nanocarrier or is both on the surface of the nanocarrier and encapsulated within the nanocarrier. In some embodiments, the small molecule is an addictive substance. In some embodiments, the addictive substance is nicotine. In some embodiments, the small molecule is a toxin. In some embodiments, the toxin is from a chemical weapon, an agent of biowarfare, or a hazardous environmental agent.
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So, the patent discusses the possibility of incorporating a toxin into the nanocarrier, and that toxin could originate in a chemical weapon or biowarfare agent.

Why would you want to do that?

As the patent explains:


The nanocarrier, in some embodiments, can be used to induce or enhance an immune response to a poorly immunogenic antigen (e.g., a small molecule or carbohydrate) in a subject. In some embodiments, the nanocarrier can be be used to induce or enhance an immune response to an addictive substance in a subject. In some embodiments, the nanocarrier can be used to induce or enhance an immune response to a toxin in a subject. The nanocarrier, in some embodiments, can be used to treat a subject that has or is susceptible to an addiction.
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In other words, the nanocarrier is intended to provide an enhanced immune response to a molecule that would not normally trigger a strong response, due for example to its small size.

That section continues:

The nanocarrier, in some embodiments, can be used to treat a subject that has been or will be exposed to a toxin. In some embodiments, the nanocarrier can be used to treat and/or prevent infectious disease, cancer, allergy, asthma (including allergic asthma), or autoimmune disease (including rheumatoid arthritis). In other embodiments, the nanocarriers can be used for immune suppression in connection with transplants to ameliorate transplant rejection.
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This makes clear what the rationale behind incorporating a toxin in the nanocarrier is: to produce a heightened immune response to a toxin, without the need to expose people to dangerous levels of the toxin. This would make it possible to vaccinate people against biowarfare or chemical weapons.

Claiming the patent is describing the vaccine as a bioweapon is totally incorrect: the patent describes a vaccine technology that could potentially protect people from bioweapons.
 
Claiming the patent is describing the vaccine as a bioweapon is totally incorrect: the patent describes a vaccine technology that could potentially protect people from bioweapons.
Yup, a classic case of deliberate misinterpretation. And the tech's barely worth patenting, it's barely different from techniques done for hundreds of years. "using mRNA" seems to be the biotech equivalent of IT's "over the internet" or "on a mobile device".

E.g. the injecting of rabbits with toxins to develop tolerance from waaaaay back:
Source: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7ziWrneMYss
 
Dosage matters.

Every medication can kill you if you're exposed to too much of it, up to and including tap water. Lower the dose enough and it's harmless.

If you want to scare people, don't mention dosages (most of your audience hates numbers anyway) and suggest that because a big dose is harmful, the small dose will be, too. Ignore the extensive testing and clinical trials that vaccines and other medication has to undergo before being cleared for public use. Drugs can be unexpectedly harmful, but rarely in the sense of "people dropping like flies" (and for that, something goes wrong in the fabrication process).
 
If you want to scare people, don't mention dosages (most of your audience hates numbers anyway) and suggest that because a big dose is harmful, the small dose will be, too.
I wonder if the homeopathy fans in the audience would become irate...
 
I wonder if the homeopathy fans in the audience would become irate...
Well, homeopathy works off the principle that because the big dose has an effect, the smallest dose does, too—just that it's beneficial and not harmful. And obviously homeopathy uses "natural" poisons.

Article:
Homeopathy, also known as homeopathic medicine, is a medical system that was developed in Germany more than 200 years ago. It’s based on two unconventional theories:

• “Like cures like”—the notion that a disease can be cured by a substance that produces similar symptoms in healthy people.

• “Law of minimum dose”—the notion that the lower the dose of the medication, the greater its effectiveness. Many homeopathic products are so diluted that no molecules of the original substance remain.

Homeopathic products come from plants (such as red onion, arnica [mountain herb], poison ivy, belladonna [deadly nightshade], and stinging nettle), minerals (such as white arsenic), or animals (such as crushed whole bees).

[...] A number of the key concepts underlying the theory of homeopathy are not consistent with fundamental scientific concepts as we understand them. [...]
 
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