Forty healthy adults aged 65 or older took either six milligrams of spermidine or placebo daily for 13 weeks after a third COVID-19 vaccine dose, and ScienceDaily says about one quarter initially produced very weak antibody responses; the study followed one post-vaccine period in one age group, not routine vaccination broadly. [1]

The paper's July 19 account of a 399-person fluvoxamine trial kept one symptom result below cure and approval; this pilot is roughly one-tenth that size and measures immune markers rather than illness.

Among poor responders receiving spermidine, the release reports higher antibodies, stronger neutralization against several variants, lower cellular-senescence markers and increased autophagy, with no treatment-related adverse effects reported in the release and improvements concentrated among participants whose initial response was poor. [1]

Those endpoints do not show that participants developed fewer infections, avoided severe disease or received durable protection, while the source does not provide group sizes, allocation details, effect sizes, multiplicity controls or the complete adverse-event collection needed to judge the signal, including how many poor responders were in each arm.

The pilot is an early reason to study a specific intervention in a defined older population, not approval, a food claim or guidance to take a supplement; replication across larger groups and other vaccines, clinical outcomes and fuller safety reporting must come before a marker change becomes a patient benefit.

-- NORA WHITFIELD, Chicago