Alliance for Pandemic Preparedness

April 8, 2020

Connecting BCG Vaccination and COVID-19: Additional Data

Category:

Topic:

  • Reasons for wide variation in severity of COVID-19 across affected countries around the world remain unknown. Two recent studies suggest a link between BCG vaccination policy and morbidity and mortality due to COVID-19. Dayal and Gupta compared the case fatality rates of COVID-19 between countries with high disease burden and those with BCG revaccination policies. 
  • They report a significant difference in the CFR between the two groups of countries. They conclude that universal BCG vaccination may have protective effect on the course of COVID-19, probably preventing progression to severe disease and death. 

Dayal and Gupta. (April 08, 2020). Connecting BCG Vaccination and COVID-19: Additional Data. Pre-print downloaded Apr 8 from https://doi.org/10.1101/2020.04.07.20053272