TY - JOUR AU - Pereira, Marcos AU - Paixão, Enny AU - Trajman, Anete AU - de Souza, Ramon Andrade AU - da Natividade, Marcio Santos AU - Pescarini, Julia M. AU - Pereira, Susan Martins AU - Barreto, Florisneide Rodrigues AU - Ximenes, Ricardo AU - Dalcomo, Margareth AU - Ichihara, Maria Yury AU - Nunes, Ceuci AU - Barral-Netto, Manoel AU - Barreto, Maurício L. PY - 2020 DA - 2020/07/11 TI - The need for fast-track, high-quality and low-cost studies about the role of the BCG vaccine in the fight against COVID-19 JO - Respiratory Research SP - 178 VL - 21 IS - 1 AB - Bacillus Calmette-Guérin (BCG) vaccination is routine and near-universal in many low- and middle-income countries (LMIC). It has been suggested that BCG can have a protective effect on COVID-19 morbidity and mortality. This commentary discusses the limitations of the evidence around BCG and COVID-19. We argue that higher-quality evidence is necessary to understand the protective effect of the BCG vaccine from existing, secondary data, while we await results from clinical trials currently conducted in different settings. SN - 1465-993X UR - https://doi.org/10.1186/s12931-020-01439-4 DO - 10.1186/s12931-020-01439-4 ID - Pereira2020 ER -