Ethereum
The Shiba Inu Tokens Vitalik Never Asked For Are Funding a COVID Vaccine Trial
Oct 13, 2026, 10:29 UTC
Ethereum
Oct 13, 2026, 10:29 UTC
Oct 13, 2026, 10:29 UTC2 min read
Ethereum co-founder Vitalik Buterin has helped bankroll a COVID-19 vaccine now in human trials. The millions behind it trace back to Shiba Inu (SHIB) tokens he never asked to receive.
SHIB itself, however, is struggling. The meme coin has dropped 4.33% in 24 hours, yet the Shiba Inu team says it shows early signs of a breakout.
PopVax, a biotech startup based in Hyderabad, India, dosed its first two volunteers in Melbourne, Australia, on August 31.
According to PopVax, Balvi, Vitalik Buterin’s science fund, and the Gates Foundation put $20 million into the program. The startup says Balvi’s money came from Shiba Inu tokens sent to Buterin without his consent.
Those tokens arrived in May 2021, when Shiba Inu’s anonymous creators sent Buterin half of the supply. He burned 90% of them, worth over $6 billion at the time.
Buterin then made a $1 billion COVID donation to an Indian relief fund. Balvi later grew out of that same Shiba Inu money.
PopVax founder Soham Sankaran says the vaccine will go open-source with Balvi once Phase I ends.
One more thing: after the Phase I trial concludes, we'll be making this vaccine open-source in collaboration with @VitalikButerin's Balvi Fund! Anyone who wants to make a vaccine for SARS-CoV-2 or its close cousins in the Betacoronavirus genus can build on ours without a license. Soham Sankaran (@sohamsankaran) October 11, 2026
Sankaran explains the goal in the company’s announcement.
We want humanity to have an even better head start next time: a broadly-protective, refrigerator-stable vaccine that any scientist, vaccine producer, or member of the public, located anywhere, can improve, adapt to their needs, and manufacture without having to worry about IP. PopVax
Buterin also recommended PopVax to his followers on X.
For anyone who is either a fan of vaccines, or a critic of vaccines but open-minded to the idea that vaccines *could* be great if they were made with a more open-source open-science and public-spirited approach, I highly recommend checking out PopVax. vitalik.eth (@VitalikButerin) October 12, 2026
Meanwhile, the meme coin that seeded Balvi’s vaccine money is under pressure.
The team says forced selling within crypto deepened the drop. In its view, this pattern typically appears when heavy leverage meets a pullback.
$SHIB is down 2.53% today! The drop was exacerbated by forced selling within the crypto ecosystem itself, a typical symptom of high leverage during pullbacks. Keep your heads up. We are all in this together!— Shiba Inu (@ShibainuCoin) October 12, 2026
The losses stretch beyond a single day.
Even so, the team argues that the market is turning bullish again. It adds that SHIB is flashing early breakout signals.
The market is starting to turn bullish again, and SHIB is showing early signs of a potential breakout.— Shiba Inu (@ShibainuCoin) October 12, 2026
That optimism follows the crypto market’s aggressive selloff earlier this month, which left leveraged traders exposed.
Not every trader agrees. In June, one prominent trader dismissed SHIB as dead.
Ultimately, Buterin’s vaccine bet shows how unsolicited Shiba Inu wealth can fund open science. Similar money now backs crypto’s longevity bet, too. That legacy may outlast any single SHIB breakout.
