May 06, 2022
Māori in durable Covid vaccine search
The first winner of the Malaghan Institute’s Te Urungi Fellowship for Māori researchers is excited to be working on what she calls the Covid booster to beat all boosters.
Theresa Pankhurst from Ngāi Tahu, Ngāti Kahungunu and Ngāti Porou is working with the institute’s internationally-recognised immune system research team for a year before heading off to Cambridge University in the UK.
She’s conducting pre-clinical tests on a booster vaccine that would work for all variants of the Covid-19 virus.
“So this is what we call a broadly neutralising or cross neutralising type of vaccine that can attack Delta, Omicron, all these different variants and also one that will provide that broadly-neutralising protection for a long time so five to 10+ years,” Dr Pankhurst says.
She’s also talking with Māori researchers and communities about what she might try to learn at Cambridge that she can bring back to New Zealand to benefit Māori.