Originally Posted by
jfsully
I was talking specifically about the mechanics of genetic transcription, inheritance, etc., not about the genes themselves. Yes, species differ genetically, although not as much as you would think. But that's beside the point. The central dogma of DNA->RNA->protein is not universal, but it is exactly as applicable in humans as it is in other mammals. And the vast majority of what we have learned about this, from bacteriophage viruses on up to chimps, is directly transferable to understanding how genes work on the cellular level in humans.
If you're wondering whether a scrap of mRNA is going to worm its way back into a nucleus and add a heritable mutation, which is what most people worried about "messing with genetics" are thinking of, then testing this concept on an animal cell is pretty much as good as on a human cell. And that's been done many many times over decades. And there are several drugs out there that use some version of introducing RNA for therapeutic effect, as you point out, so this has been tested in humans as well.
You are completely correct that many if not the majority of drugs that work in other animals fail to be as useful in humans. I wasn't trying to make a point on the efficacy of an mRNA vaccine, only on its safety.