COVID-19 vaccination programmes are ongoing worldwide. Neutralizing antibodies are thought to be key for host protection against COVID-19; however, strategies that focus only on neutralizing antibodies may not be sufficient to cope with the pandemic in the longer term owing to the decay of antibody titres and the emergence of antibody-escape variants of SARS-CoV-2. Here, we describe the protective roles of T cells in COVID-19 and the conservation of T cell epitopes in SARS-CoV-2 variants of concern, and discuss the potential contribution of T cell-oriented strategies to controlling the COVID-19 pandemic. This Comment article proposes that T cell-oriented vaccine strategies should be considered to control the COVID-19 pandemic in the longer term, given declining levels of neutralizing antibodies with time after vaccination or infection and the emergence of viral escape variants.

中文翻译：

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用于控制 COVID-19 大流行的 T 细胞导向策略

COVID-19 疫苗接种计划正在全球范围内进行。中和抗体被认为是宿主抵御 COVID-19 的关键；然而，由于抗体滴度下降和 SARS-CoV-2 抗体逃逸变体的出现，仅关注中和抗体的策略可能不足以长期应对大流行。在这里，我们描述了 T 细胞在 COVID-19 中的保护作用和 SARS-CoV-2 相关变体中 T 细胞表位的保护，并讨论了 T 细胞导向策略对控制 COVID-19 大流行的潜在贡献。这篇评论文章提出，应考虑以 T 细胞为导向的疫苗策略，以控制更长期的 COVID-19 大流行，