Humans will begin trials of an experimental coronavirus vaccine today, a senior US official has revealed.
Forty-five participants in Seattle – which is currently being ravaged by an outbreak – will receive the jab to test it is safe.
None of the volunteers, who are aged between 18 and 55, will be infected at this point. Further trials are planned if the vaccine is safe.
Dozens of pharmaceutical firms and universities across the world are in a race against time to create a COVID-19 vaccine.
Leading officials have already warned a jab to protect millions could be a year away, meaning thousands will die in the meantime.
More than 170,000 cases have already been confirmed worldwide, and at least 6,500 patients are known to have died.
The World Health Organization says 35 experimental vaccines are in development, including one co-developed by the US government.
The National Institutes of Health is funding the trial of the jab, which was created alongside Massachusetts-based Moderna.
The first participant in the phase one trial – the earliest stage of human drug research – will receive the vaccine today, an official revealed.
None of the patients will be infected with the coronavirus at this stage.
All of the patients will receive the experimental jab at the Kaiser Permanente Washington Health Research Institute in Seattle.
The source who disclosed plans for the first participant spoke on condition of anonymity because the move has not been publicly announced.
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Public health officials say it will still take a year to 18 months to fully validate any potential vaccine – despite human trials beginning.
There is no chance participants could get infected from the shots, because they don’t contain the virus itself.
The goal is purely to check that the vaccines show no worrisome side effects, setting the stage for larger tests.
Dozens of research groups across the world, including Moderna, have taken a different route to traditional vaccine techniques.
Normally a weaker bug is planted in the body so a patient can adapt to fight off the infection – like the MMR vaccine.
But Moderna’s sees messenger RNA stimulate the immune system to make similar proteins to the killer virus, which it can then combat.
Inovio Pharmaceuticals aims to begin safety tests of its vaccine candidate next month in a few dozen volunteers.
Volunteers will be recruited in Pennsylvania and Kansas City, before tests are repeated in China and South Korea.
Dr Anthony Fauci, director of NIH’s National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, said it will take up to a year-and-a-half before humans can get a vaccine.
President Donald Trump has been pushing for swift action on a vaccine, saying in recent days that the work is ‘moving along very quickly’.
The UK Government has already pumped up to £50million into projects to rush through a vaccine and save millions.
Today, there are no proven treatments. In China, scientists have been testing a combination of HIV drugs against the new coronavirus.
Other doctors have used an experimental drug named remdesivir that was in development to fight Ebola.
In the US, the University of Nebraska Medical Center also began testing remdesivir in some Americans evacuated from a cruise ship in Japan.
For most people, the new coronavirus causes only mild or moderate symptoms, such as fever and cough.
For some, especially older adults and people with existing health problems, it can cause more severe illness, including pneumonia.
It comes as German officials are trying to stop the Donald Trump administration from luring German biopharmaceutical company CureVac to the US to get its experimental coronavirus vaccines exclusively for Americans.
The President has offered funds to lure the company CureVac to the US, according to reports in a German newspaper.
The German government made counter-offers to make the company stay, the Welt am Sonntag reports.
An unidentified German government source told the paper Trump is trying to secure the scientists’ work exclusively, and would do anything to get a vaccine for the United States – but only for the United States’.
CureVac said last week they are working on with a multitude of coronavirus vaccine candidates and are selecting the two best to go into clinical trials.
The company’s CEO met with President Donald Trump and the White House Coronavirus Task Force to discuss a vaccine earlier this month.
German politicians are now insisting that no country should have a monopoly on any future vaccine.
(Dailymail)
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