Inside the extraordinary race to invent a coronavirus vaccine

Source: Washington Post

By Carolyn Y. Johnson

Companies are launching trials at an unprecedented pace, but some worry about the trade-offs between speed and safety.

Ian Haydon, a healthy 29-year-old, reported to a medical clinic in Seattle for a momentous blood draw last week.

“Oh yeah,” said the nurse taking his blood. “That is liquid gold.”

Haydon is an obscure but important participant in the most consequential race for a vaccine in medical history. In early April, he was among the first people in the United States to receive an experimental vaccine that could help end the coronavirus crisis. He volunteered to be a test subject knowing about the risks and unknowns, but eager to do his part to help end the worst pandemic in a century.

Scientists at the National Institutes of Health in Bethesda, Md., will study blood from Haydon and others for signs that the vaccine triggered an immune response to a pathogen they have never encountered. It would be the first, preliminary signal that the vaccine could provide immunity to covid-19, the disease caused by the virus, that has claimed more than 200,000 lives.

A coronavirus vaccine has become the light at the end of a very long tunnel, the tool that will bring the virus to heel, allowing people to attend sports events, hug friends, celebrate weddings and grieve at funerals. The goal to deliver a vaccine in 12 to 18 months, often repeated by the nation’s top infectious disease scientist, has become the one reassuring refrain during briefings on the crisis. The White House put together a task force called Operation Warp Speed to try to move even faster, making hundreds of millions of doses ready by January.

With at least 115 vaccine projects in laboratories at companies and research labs, the science is hurtling forward so fast and bending so many rules about how the process usually works that even veteran vaccine developers do not know what to expect.

Read further

The best of the Muslim Times’ collection for war against Covid 19:

In this day and age, understanding bacteria and viruses and developing vaccines are national security issues. In my view sizable part of every country’s defense budget should be spent in these pursuits rather than making tanks and other weapons.

For the latest news about drugs and vaccines’ trials please go to: Pharmaceutical-Technology

Kaiser Permanente launches first coronavirus vaccine trial

Corona Fear’s Cure: Chanting from the Bible and the Quran

Can You Chant from the Bible or the Quran to Bliss and Happiness?

Japanese flu drug ‘clearly effective’ in treating coronavirus, says China

Synthetic antibodies might offer a quick coronavirus treatment

The Four Possible Timelines for Life Returning to Normal

The Muslim Times Recommending Universal BCG Vaccination to Fight the Pandemic

Coronavirus: TB Vaccination Trial Started in Melbourne, Australia

The Muslim Times has the best collections in the war against Covid 19 as we are collecting from all the established sources

All of humanity are intimate neighbors: Coronavirus proves it once again

Praise be to God for the Miracle of Our Immune System

USA: 15-minute coronavirus test is here

Does the Ordinary Soap Kill Coronavirus?

Here’s a list of disinfectants you can use against coronavirus

For the number of cases and epidemiology in each country go to: WorldOMeters

Categories: The Muslim Times, Vaccine

Leave a Reply