The world is desperately waiting for medical miracle, i.e. Coronavirus vaccine. More than 100 projects around the world are racing to develop a vaccine against this novel Coronavirus that has pounced on more than 6 million people and claimed 3 lakh 80 thousand lives till the date.
While hundreds of speculations, opinions and reports are up on the internet about the making of Coronavirus vaccine, I have compiled some pointers that you would easily understand what exactly is going on in the medical world.
#1 It takes years, a decade or more for a new medication to come up in the market for public. Reasons? Multiple phases and steps from initial research to clinical trials (animal testing etc.) are involved in the invention. And yes, a lot of fortune.
#2 So, scientists looked forward to considering the medicines that are already in existence, for potential treatment of Coronavirus. That means, some antiviral drugs that are used in the treatment of other diseases are also implemented to coronavirus patients.
#3 Till the date, WHO has a record of 10 candidate vaccines in clinical evaluation and 123 candidate vaccines in preclinical evaluation. Let’s be happy about the progress.
#4 These candidate vaccines were considered for infections like SARS, Ebola, Plague, HIV, etc.
#5 There’s no official conclusion that any of these vaccine candidates would work effectively for Coronavirus anytime soon. But there are many reasons to stay optimistic.
#6 Moderna is one of the leading candidates and had begun Covid vaccine’s safety testing in humans, in March, which is reported to be given possible results.
Anthony S. Fauci, director of National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases has announced that Moderna company’s Phase III Covid vaccine will be further experimented in 30,000 patients (from all age groups) in July. Wow!
#7 An experimental vaccine developed at Oxford University has achieved significant success in reaching the advanced trial phase. The vaccine is being tested in more than 10,000 people in the UK. If everything goes as expected, the vaccine will be available in the market from September/October this year. Fingers crossed!
#8 Other than Moderna, companies like Pfizer, AstraZeneca, BioNTech, Johnson & Johnson etc, are in the vaccine-invention race.
#9 UK’s pharmaceutical company AstraZeneca says it is working on producing 2 million doses of Coronavirus vaccine which could be ready by this September.
#10 American company Pfizer has partnered with German company BioNTech to develop the Coronavirus vaccine. Pfizer has said, most probably it will have its vaccine ready by the end of this October.
We believe we will soon hear the good news and Coronavirus will be a thing of the past. Till the Coronavirus vaccine comes to us, let’s take precautions and stay safe ❤!
Originally published at https://leenachitwan.com on June 4, 2020.
