COVID-19 Vaccines To Begin First Clinical Trial
COVID-19 VACCINES – The new coronavirus, COVID-19 affected millions worldwide.
The World Health Organization had officially tagged it as a pandemic. As such, experts in the medical field rush to create a solution to this global problem.
Luckily, Moderna Therapeutics, a biotech company in Cambridge had mass shipped the first batches of COVID-19 vaccines.
According to an article from Time Magazine, the first vials were sent to the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases (NIAID). As such, human testing of the vaccine will be ready as early as April.
Meanwhile, the National Institutes of Health began testing a drug called “remdesivir“. The drug was previously developed for treating ebola.
As per the article, the first patient to volunteer was back from the US after being tested for the virus aboard the Diamond Princess. Others who have tested positive for the virus will also be part of the study.
Meanwhile, Moderna’s vaccine was reported to be created in just 42 days. This was attributed to a relatively new genetic method that doesn’t require huge amounts of the virus.
Instead, it is packed with mRNA. These are genetic material derived from DNA and creates proteins.
mRNA is really like a software molecule in biology. So our vaccine is like the software program to the body, which then goes and makes the [viral] proteins that can generate an immune response.
Because of this, the method of creating the vaccine can be scaled quickly, saving critical time in this pandemic.
Currently, there are over 169, 615 cases of COVID-19 worldwide. Along with this, the virus has caused 6,515 fatalities. However, 77,753 have recovered.
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