Here’s our updated timeline on the global search for the coronavirus vaccine:
December 31: New coronavirus identified
China reports a cluster of pneumonia cases in Wuhan City, leading to the identification of a new coronavirus.
January 10: Scientists reveal the genome of a new coronavirus
A week and a half after China reported a new form of pneumonia, scientists map the genome sequence of what is later identified as COVID-19, a key first step on the road to finding a vaccine.
January 11: Scientists publish molecular blueprint of new coronavirus
The sequenced coronavirus genome is published, marking the beginning of international efforts to study a vaccine.
March 16 – Vaccine trial begins in the U.S.
The US National Institutes of Health begins testing an “investigational” vaccine on 45 healthy adults, ages 18 to 55, after promising results in animal models.
The trial is funded by the US National Institutes of Health and Massachusetts-based biotech company Moderna Inc and runs for six weeks.
The vaccine is officially called mRNA-1273.
April 2: “Trials to test COVID-19 tuberculosis vaccine ongoing”
The French National Institute for Medical and Health Research says that “clinical trials to test the efficacy of the BCG vaccine against COVID-19 are underway or about to start in the Netherlands, Germany, France, Spain and Australia.”
April 8: At least 115 vaccines under study worldwide
Nature.com says that “the overall R&D outlook for the COVID-19 vaccine includes 115 candidate vaccines, 73 of which are currently in the exploratory or preclinical stages.”
Among the most advanced candidates who have advanced in clinical development are vaccines tested by Inovio, Moderna, CanSino Biologicals and the Shenzhen Genoimmune Medical Institute.
April 13: EU pledges € 80 million for vaccine research
EU funds are intended to support the German biopharmaceutical company CureVac in the development of a vaccine.
April 14: GSK and Sanofi team up to find COVID-19 vaccine
The British-French duo GlaxoSmithKline and Sanofi announce clinical trials for the second half of 2020, hoping to make, if these trials are successful, the vaccine widely available for the second half of 2021.
April 22: Germany announces the start of clinical trials for the coronavirus vaccine
BioNTech from Germany and its American partner Pfizer receive the green light from the Paul-Ehrlich Institute, the German authority for vaccine certification, to begin testing a variety of experimental vaccines on 200 healthy volunteers, aged 18 to 55.
April 24: Oxford University begins human trials for coronavirus vaccine
Tests of the drug ChAdOx1 nCoV-19 begin in 1,112 people divided into two groups (half of them receiving a vaccine and the other half a placebo), with the aim of stimulating their immune system to attack the virus.
The drug was created using a chimpanzee virus that was genetically modified to carry coronaviruses.
The UK government is financing the trial with a contribution of € 51 million.
Health Secretary Matt Hancock says the drug has an 80 percent success rate.
May 13: Political dispute between France and the United States over the priority of the vaccine
French pharmaceutical giant Sanofi sparks a political storm by saying it would give the United States priority access to a vaccine, as it was the first country to fund research.
French Secretary of State for Economy and Finance Agnes Pannier-Runacher says it is “unacceptable”, while Prime Minister Edouard Philippe calls on the Sanofi CEO to reassure himself about the vaccine’s distribution.
May 22: Oxford University / AstraZeneca vaccine enters phase two of its trial
More than 10,000 adults and children participate in phase two of their clinical trial, ten times more than the first phase that began in April.
This phase will study whether different age groups react differently to the vaccine.
A third phase is established to verify whether the vaccine protects people from contracting coronavirus by studying a large group of people over 18 years of age.
June 13: European countries partner to achieve big vaccine deal
Pharmaceutical giant AstraZeneca says it has reached an agreement with Germany, Italy, the Netherlands and France to supply up to 400 million doses of the vaccine that the University of Oxford is testing.
If successful, delivery will begin in late 2020.
The Swedish-British company had already signed similar agreements with Britain, the US, the Norwegian-based Coalition for Outbreak Preparedness Innovations (CEPI) and the international vaccine alliance Gavi.
An agreement was also reached with the Indian Whey Institute for one billion doses.
June 15: Imperial College London announces the start of human trials of vaccines
Three hundred healthy people participate in the Imperial College study by receiving two doses of a potential vaccine.
Liquid drops transport genetic material into the patient’s bloodstream, replicating part of the virus within the body and forcing the immune system to learn to fight it.
If the test shows a promising response, larger trials will be conducted later in the year with around 6,000 healthy volunteers.
The study is being funded with around € 46 million from the UK government plus another € 5.5 million from philanthropic donations.
June 16: UK begins using steroids in COVID-19 patients after successful trial
A successful treatment is discovered. It is not a vaccine, but it works.
The University of Oxford finds that inexpensive synthetic steroid dexamethasone reduces COVID-19 deaths by up to a third after testing it in 2,100 people with severe respiratory complications caused by coronavirus.
The UK government says it will start using it on patients right away and that it has already stored 200,000 courses of the drug.
June 16: What potential vaccine is leading the race?
For June 16 out of 13 candidates, the vaccine in the most advanced phase of the trials is the University of Oxford and the drug ChAdOx1 nCoV-19 from AstraZeneca, with ongoing studies to determine “its efficacy, safety and immunogenicity”.
The country working on the highest number of vaccines in a clinical phase at the moment is China, followed by the United States, the United Kingdom and Germany.
June 25: EU authorizes use of antiviral drugs to treat COVID-19
More treatments are identified. The European Medicines Agency (EMA) recommends that the antiviral drug remdesivir be authorized to treat patients with COVID-19 in the European Union.
Considered by Donald Trump and other health officials as a promising treatment, the drug will be tested in adults and teens 12 years and older with oxygen-requiring pneumonia.
June 27: Ursula von der Leyen praises the success of the vaccine fundraising campaign
The president of the EU Commission says more than € 6 billion was raised in the campaign launched with the activist organization Global Citizen “Global Goal: United for our Future”. It increases the total collected by the EU institutions to more than 16 billion euros.
June 27: Brazil gets up to 100 million doses of vaccines tested at Oxford University
Brazil signs a € 113 million agreement with AstraZeneca for access to a vaccine that is being tested at the University of Oxford. The agreement entitles him to produce an initial amount of 30 million doses in December and January when the vaccine is still in the testing phase.
If the vaccine passes clinical trials, Brazil will be able to produce an additional 70 million doses at an estimated cost of € 2.05 each.
The agreement includes access rights to the vaccine technology and the manufacturing process.
Called ChAdOx1 nCoV-19, the drug is being tested in the UK, Brazil and South Africa.
July 1: ‘Positive results’ from BioNTech-Pfizer vaccine tests
Pfizer and BioNTech report that their experimental BNT162b1 vaccine “is capable of producing neutralizing antibody responses in humans at or above levels observed in convalescent sera, and that it does so at relatively low dose levels.”
The vaccine is being tested on 45 participants ages 18 to 55 in the U.S.
In this phase, the test aims to verify that the vaccine is non-toxic and triggers a response by the immune system against the virus.
Three other vaccine candidates are being tested as part of the BNT162 program.
July 7: Novavax receives $ 1.6 billion from the United States government for 100 million vaccines
Novavax receives $ 1.6 billion (€ 1.4 billion) from the United States government for developing a vaccine that includes a phase 3 clinical trial; large-scale manufacturing facility; and deliver 100 million doses of NVX-CoV2373, its candidate for the COVID-19 vaccine, by the end of 2020.
It is part of the U.S. government’s Operation Warp Speed, a program that seeks to start delivering millions of doses of a safe and effective vaccine for COVID-19 next year.
Regeneron Pharmaceuticals has received $ 450 million (€ 397 million) to manufacture and supply its own candidate for the COVID-19 vaccine, REGN-COV2.
The agreement supports continued manufacturing so the product can be immediately available in the US if clinical trials are successful.
July 10: UK rejects possibility of joining EU COVID-19 vaccine scheme
The UK officially rejects the opportunity to join the European Union’s coronavirus vaccine scheme.
The talks had been “ongoing” between London and Brussels after the bloc approached the United Kingdom earlier this month to establish whether it wanted to cooperate on its approach to produce and distribute an effective COVID-19 vaccine.
But the UK government confirms on July 10 that it has decided not to participate in the plan.
July 12: Vaccine ‘unlikely’ by 2021, says expert from French scientific council
The probability of having a 100% “effective” vaccine against the coronavirus in 2021 is low, says epidemiologist Arnaud Fontanet, urging the French to “return to more serious habits” in the face of the risk of an epidemic.
“A vaccine is several years old, of course, there is an unprecedented effort to develop this vaccine, but I would be very surprised if we had an effective vaccine by 2021,” says Fontanet.
“We will probably have a vaccine that will work partially,” he added, and insisted that “the end of the epidemic” is still far away.
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