It would be nice to just be automatically vaccinated for everything just by hanging out.
Even if you were to create a novel virus to achieve that goal something nasty would eventually evolve to mimic it and we’d have no defense.
Yes. There are virus vector vaccines already in existence: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Viral_vector_vaccine
For example, adenovirus vector vaccines were created for COVID-19: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/COVID-19_vaccine#Adenovirus_vector_vaccines
Those are non-replicating though.
Live attenuated vaccines also exist – which can replicate – but those work by using a weakened/modified version of the original harmful live virus the vaccine is intended to protect against: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Attenuated_vaccine
Oral polio vaccine is a well-known example.
That’s how “I am legend” started.
So you want to engineer a living, evolving, highly contagious virus that contains enough of a dangerous virus to train your immune system to be resistant to that dangerous disease?
Do you not see how bad an idea that is?
No, that’s why I asked. Hopefully someone can enlighten us.
I’ll enlighten you, It’s a bad idea. Engineering intentionally contagious things is far too likely to go wrong.
Laughter is contagious. Surely other good things can be contagious, too.
