Updated: August 29, 2020 8:10:16 am
US President Donald Trump has promised to produce a vaccine for Covid-19 before the end of this year, “or it may even be earlier.” (AP Photo: Charles Krupa)
Coronavirus Vaccine Tracker (COVID-19): The timeline for a new coronavirus vaccine appears to have advanced steadily, from early next year to the end of the year. On Friday, US President Donald Trump promised to produce a vaccine before the end of this year, “or it may even be earlier.”
And in a separate development, Britain said it would amend its laws to ensure that a new coronavirus vaccine receives emergency approval as soon as it is declared safe in clinical trials. She said she would not wait for the full licensing process to complete. The new legal provision could go into effect as early as October this year, allowing its drug regulator to grant emergency approvals for a vaccine that has been shown to be safe. The amended law would also protect drug companies from being sued if the vaccines produced side effects.
Trump has also previously argued that the possibility of a vaccine being available this year could not be ruled out. But Friday was more emphatic than ever. “We will have a safe and effective vaccine this year, and together we will squash the virus,” he said, accepting the Republic Party’s nomination to run again as president.
However, plans in both the US and the UK would depend on at least one of the clinical trials of the vaccine being completed and its results declared safe and effective. So far, most vaccine developers have argued that their product is likely to be ready early next year.
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Initial vaccine supplies will be limited: CDC Chief
Meanwhile, the director of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) in the United States has said that even if the vaccines were ready in time for early next year, supplies would be limited for some time.
“At first, there will probably be a limited supply of one or more of the Covid-19 vaccines, because there will be limited doses available,” said CDC Director Robert Redfield.
“It is important that the first vaccines are distributed in a fair, ethical and transparent manner,” he said.
The United States has reserved 800 million doses of vaccines from different developers. Assuming each of these candidate vaccines is successful in trials and approved by the drug regulator, it would still take several months to manufacture those many doses. Not all vaccines are likely to be successful and that could also result in a shortage of vaccine supplies.
Search for the coronavirus vaccine: the story so far
- More than 170 candidate vaccines in clinical or preclinical trials
- 31 of them in clinical trials
- Six in final stages, phase III human trials
- At least eight potential vaccines are under development in India. Two of them have entered phase II trials after completing phase I.
(As of Aug 25; source: WHO Coronavirus Vaccine Overview Aug 25, 2020)
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