ArticleScience advances2020
Mandated Bacillus Calmette-Guérin (BCG) vaccination predicts flattened curves for the spread of COVID-19.
Article in Science advances, 2020. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. It is linked to trial NCT04534803 (Bacillus Calmette-Guerin Against Covid-19 for Prevention and Amelioration of Severity Trial), which is not on this map. Cited by 91 papers, 1 of them a synthesis that pooled it.
What it found
Each row is one number read from the abstract, on the scale the paper reported it, with its interval. Left of the dashed line favours the treatment, right favours the comparator. Under each row is the sentence it came from. New to these charts? A ten-minute tutorial.
The abstract states no effect estimate the extractor could read, or names no intervention and outcome on the map, so this paper lights no cell and moves no belief. It is still indexed, cited and linked below.
The trial behind it
Trials whose registry record cites this paper, or whose number appears in the abstract. A trial that started after this paper was published is citing it as background, not reporting it.
Bacillus Calmette-Guerin Against Covid-19 for Prevention and Amelioration of Severity Trial
Who cites it
91 citing papers in PubMed, 1 synthesis or guideline pooled it.
- Effectiveness of Bacille Calmette-Guerin vaccination policies in reducing infection and mortality of COVID-19: a systematic review.Global health research and policy · 2022Pooled it
- Multiple BCG vaccinations for the prevention of COVID-19 and other infectious diseases in type 1 diabetes.Cell reports. Medicine · 2022Trial
- ACTIVATE-2: A Double-Blind Randomized Trial of BCG Vaccination Against COVID-19 in Individuals at Risk.Frontiers in immunology · 2022Trial
- Bacillus Calmette-Guérin Vaccination and SARS-CoV-2 Infection among Healthcare Workers: A Case-Control Study in Cape Verde.Portuguese journal of public health · 2026Article
- Trained immunity modulators: A new frontier in immunoregulation and disease intervention.Journal of advanced research · 2026Review
- The TRIM-cancer paradox: BCG as a programmable vaccine platform and a mechanistic probe for rational immunotherapy design.Frontiers in immunology · 2026Review
- Review
- Long-term immune changes after COVID-19 and the effect of BCG vaccination and latent infections on disease severity.Clinical & translational immunology · 2025Article
- An Information-Theoretic Method for Identifying Effective Treatments and Policies at the Beginning of a Pandemic.Entropy (Basel, Switzerland) · 2024Article
- Efficacy and outcomes of BCG re-vaccination in COVID-19: a systematic review, meta-analysis, and meta-regression of randomized controlled trials.Annals of medicine and surgery (2012) · 2024Review
- Impact of SARS-CoV-2 vaccination and of seasonal variations on the innate immune inflammatory response.Frontiers in immunology · 2024Article
- Excluding Participants With Mycobacteria Infections From Clinical Trials: A Critical Consideration in Evaluating the Efficacy of BCG Against COVID-19.Journal of Korean medical science · 2023Review
- The role of trained immunity in COVID-19: Lessons for the next pandemic.Cell host & microbe · 2023Review
- Review
- Previous BCG vaccination is associated with less severe clinical progression of COVID-19.BMC medicine · 2023Article
- BCG-induced trained immunity: history, mechanisms and potential applications.Journal of translational medicine · 2023Review
- Efficacy of BCG Vaccination against COVID-19: Systematic Review and Meta-Analysis of Randomized Controlled Trials.Journal of clinical medicine · 2023Review
- Delivery of spike-RBD by bacterial type three secretion system for SARS-CoV-2 vaccine development.Frontiers in immunology · 2023Article
- Engineering a dual vaccine against COVID-19 and tuberculosis.Frontiers in cellular and infection microbiology · 2023Article
- Influenza and Pneumococcal Vaccination and the Risk of COVID-19: A Systematic Review and Meta-Analysis.Diagnostics (Basel, Switzerland) · 2022Review
31 more citing papers are in PubMed but not listed here.
Corrections and comments
PubMed lists nothing against this paper. Absence here is not a guarantee, only a check that was made.
Authors and funding
5 authors.
Funding
No grant is acknowledged in the PubMed record.
Abstract
Bacillus Calmette-Guérin (BCG) vaccination may reduce the risk of a range of infectious diseases, and if so, it could protect against coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19). Here, we compared countries that mandated BCG vaccination until at least 2000 with countries that did not. To minimize any systematic effects of reporting biases, we analyzed the rate of the day-by-day increase in both confirmed cases (134 countries) and deaths (135 countries) in the first 30-day period of country-wise outbreaks. The 30-day window was adjusted to begin at the country-wise onset of the pandemic. Linear mixed models revealed a significant effect of mandated BCG policies on the growth rate of both cases and deaths after controlling for median age, gross domestic product per capita, population density, population size, net migration rate, and various cultural dimensions (e.g., individualism). Our analysis suggests that mandated BCG vaccination can be effective in the fight against COVID-19.
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Registered trials
Read under generation 80e0d062 · epoch 390. Bibliography from PubMed, PubMed Central and OpenAlex; grants from NIH RePORTER; trial links from ClinicalTrials.gov; estimates, votes and beliefs from the OpenQuestion graph.