Share Facts About the New Viral Vector COVID-19 Vaccine

You'll hear buzz about the new single-dose "viral vector" COVID-19 vaccine from Johnson & Johnson/Janssen (Ad26.COV2.S).

Similarly to the Pfizer-BioNTech or Moderna mRNA COVID-19 vaccines, viral vector vaccines give our cells instructions to make the SARS-CoV-2 spike protein...to trigger an immune response.

But they do it in different ways. The mRNA COVID-19 vaccines give our cells an mRNA blueprint. Johnson & Johnson's COVID-19 vaccine delivers instructions using an adenovirus "vector" that's modified and harmless.