- Coronavirus vaccine: who made it?
- Coronavirus vaccine: how does it work?
- Coronavirus vaccine: first volunteers have already taken it
Coronavirus vaccine could stop a global pandemic and make the entire population resilient. Perhaps the COVID-19 vaccine will be ready sooner than you might think: the first batches of it will soon be tested on volunteers and should be available for sale within the next 18 months.
Contents:
- Coronavirus vaccine: who made it?
- Coronavirus vaccine: how does it work?
- Coronavirus vaccine: first volunteers have already taken it
The SARS-CoV-2 coronavirus vaccine could help fight the COVID-19 pandemic in the world. Work on it began in January 2022 - attempts to develop a vaccine were undertaken by both research institutions and pharmaceutical companies.
Typically, the process of developing a new vaccine takes several years. However, in the case of the coronavirus vaccine from China, this time may be significantly shortened not only because scientists from around the world are involved in its work, but also because close relatives of the coronavirus from China are well-known to scientists SARS virus, which allowed to shorten the research on, among others virus genotype.
As long as there is no vaccine against the coronavirus, the World He alth Organization and the Chief Sanitary Inspectorate recommend that you get vaccinated against the flu.
Coronavirus vaccine: who made it?
PotentialCoronavirus vaccineSARS-CoV-2 was developed by the biotechnology company Moderna Therapeutics of Cambridge, Massachusetts, USA.
As Juan Andres, director of technical operations and quality at Moderna points out, the first batches of the vaccine were produced in exactly 42 days. An experimental vaccine called mRNA-1273 has already been donated to NIAID, the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, part of the National Institutes of He alth (NIH).
NIAID Director Anthony Fauci said in an interview with CNN that the clinical trial of the vaccine will start by the end of April 2022. Several dozen volunteers will take part in the tests, which will probably end in August (initially there were to be 25, the latest data say about 45 people).
Ifare successful, the vaccine will undergo further tests required by law. It should be available for general use within the next 12-18 months.
British scientists are also working on the vaccine. In the UK, a group of scientists and leaders from the medical industry has been formed under the leadership of Sir Patrick Vallance. Scientists are to jointly develop a vaccine against the coronavirus, which may be put into use this fall. For that to happen, however, tests must first be carried out. The Oxford lab says it should have one million samples of the coronavirus vaccine by September.
It is worth knowing that the team working on the vaccine against COVID-19 is headed by a Polish woman - Dr. Mariola Fotin-Mleczek. She is the head of technology at the German company CureVac. A Polish woman supervises the vaccine development process, which is currently in the animal testing phase and induces an appropriate immune response. Human testing is likely to start in late June.
Together Against Coronavirus
Coronavirus vaccine: how does it work?
Coronavirus vaccine is based on a new genetic method. The vaccine contains mRNA, genetic material isolated from DNA that codes for the proteins of the coronavirus.
After it is injected into the body, the cells of the immune system process mRNAs and start producing their own proteins in such a way that they are able to generate an immune response and prevent or make the infection much milder.
Does the flu vaccine affect COVID-19?
Michał Sutkowski, specialist in family medicine and internal diseases, President of Warsaw Family Physicians
When it comes to the flu vaccine, we can't say that after I got vaccinated, I wouldn't get seriously ill with COVID-19. It would be too simple and we would already have the vaccine ready. Each virus that attacks our upper respiratory tract has its own specificity.
Coronavirus binds to the ACE2 protein in the epithelium of our throat and later the upper respiratory tract. Here again, flu vaccination does not really matter at all. The flu is the flu and the coronavirus is the coronavirus.
But on the other hand, you could say that if I got the flu vaccine, most of the time I didn't have it or had only mild symptoms, so my immunity is better.
So it's worth getting the flu vaccine, regardless of the coronavirus. Because the flu itself is a very dangerous disease, and in addition, we can protect ourselves from complicationsin the case of COVID-19.
Coronavirus vaccine: first volunteers have already taken it
The first volunteer is Jennifer Haller, 43, an American, mum of two. She took the first dose of the vaccine on March 17, 2022. After that, the vaccine was given to 46-year-old Neal Browning. They will both receive two doses a month apart at the Kaiser Permanente Institute in Seattle. The vaccine was developed by the American company Moderna. If it proves effective, it will be operational in at least a year.
Another vaccine is being developed by Curevac from Germany. The owner of the Dietmar Hopp company estimated that there was a good chance that the vaccine would be ready in the fall. It is at this time that the second wave of the pandemic is forecasted.
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In early April, Johnson & Johnson announced the selection of a potential candidate for the COVID-19 vaccine. The vaccine was selected from among those that Johnson & Johnson scientists had been working on since January 2022, as soon as the genetic sequence of the SARS-CoV-2 coronavirus was isolated.
As we read in the press release: research teams at Janssen, in collaboration with Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center, part of Harvard Medical School, have created and tested numerous vaccine candidates using AdVac® technology.
Thanks to the collaboration with many scientists from various academic institutions, vaccine prototypes were then tested to identify those with the best chance of obtaining an immune response in preclinical studies.
The company announced that clinical trials in volunteers would begin by September 2022 at the latest, and that the first batches of the vaccine could be approved for emergency vaccination in early 2022.