When Covid-19 (Coronavirus) Vaccine Will Be Available Worldwide

Since the beginning of the covid-19 (coronavirus) pandemic, scientists have been working on a solution. Focus is on either a drug to cure it or a vaccine to prevent it. A drug for a cure relies on either existing drugs or research and development of a new candidate. Research into existing drugs takes a shorter time when compared to research and development into a new candidate. However, many of the existing drugs are not giving a perfect result. Although chloroquine and hydroxychloroquine has shown some degree of success.

Developing an existing drug is time consuming and difficult. The development follows several processes. However many pharmaceutical companies are on it.
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As for vaccine development, they are products that produce immunity from disease. The key ingredient in a vaccine is an inactive or weakened form of an organism such as bacteria and virus. They are relatively safer than the infection itself. Now, many people are eager to hear the good news that a vaccine has been discovered and will soon be rolled out for covid-19 That is a wishful thinking when we consider the development of vaccines. They think a vaccine should be available any moment from now when they consider the time and energy devoted to the development of a covid-19 vaccine. When they hear of clinical trials with humans, they think the result will be out soon and can be used for the rest of mankind.

Covid-19 vaccine is not on the horizon. It is still some years from now. The vaccine will pass through several stages of development. I know you will care to know the stages and how long it will take. Let's take a look at typical vaccine stages.

Stages Of Vaccine Development

Covid-19 vaccine

It takes between 10 to 15 years from the start of a vaccine development to availability. This is because scientists want to provide the best product with high efficacy and less side effects.

Exploratory

This stage is when the candidate is discovered as a potential vaccine. It involves the study of the virus, antigens, and every other thing necessary that might help prevent the disease in healthy or sick persons. It is carried out in small laboratories especially in schools, research institutes, etc. They are mostly sponsored by grants or non-government organizations (NGO). They use the lead candidate in laboratory animals like mice. The result is used to adjust the dose while observing the animals for positive and negative reactions which will give a hint for a possible success. This can take between 2-4 years.

Most of this work is well documented as a research work. Some are posted online or sent to special companies for further review. In some cases, the work is presented to a group of scientists who may pick up interest in the work to further develop the vaccine. This is when pharmaceutical companies come in.

Preclinical Trials

It is divided into three stages. They are preclinical stage I, II and III. Stage one involves using a handful of humans as test subjects, usually below 100. The test is to determine the best route, dose and dosage form including frequency. They are tested with placebo. They are closely monitored for prevention of the disease including side and adverse effects. Most vaccine candidates do not pass through this stage after failing in one of the requirements. This can take about 12-18 months.

Stage II involves using more numbers of humans from 100 to 300. If the vaccine is also for children, some children may be included in this stage after using stage I to determine the adult dose and scaling it down for children. This stage can last a period of 2 or more years.

Last stage is III in which a larger number of human volunteers are used. The number is in thousands. This is to check the effect on a larger population. We expect another 3-5 years in this stage.

Registration

If the vaccine showed marked activity or improved efficacy with less side effects (to an existing one), the developers can file for registration with the drug regulatory body of the country of development. This should not take time but should know that approval is subject to peer review and in some cases experiment to demonstrate what the peer review is saying. They also check the production process.

Quality Control

If the vaccine is approved, there is a need for mass production to meet the needs of the population. However, the effect of the vaccine can only be certain in the real world where different races will use the drug including people with different diseases and conditions. However, the company can still carry out more research on different categories of people that can use the vaccine.
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Covid-19 Vaccine Launch Date

Because of the urgent need for a vaccine, drug regulatory bodies like the food and drug administration (FDA) compromise on their stand. Most of the process is either bypassed or hastened. For example, most of the vaccines under clinical trials today for the covid-19 vaccine did not pass through animal tests. For those that did, the animals were not observed for a long time if the vaccine will elicit future adverse effects on the animal or their offspring. A step that is very crucial in normal vaccine development. There are so many vaccine candidates now that are in the clinical stage of human testing. And it will not pass through the stringent scrutiny. However, no matter how much they try to hasten the development, a positive human result must be proven before that can go for a large scale trial involving more humans. And all these will take nothing less than at least a year from the time the developer started. And some estimates are a year and a half. So if a developer started work on a covid-19 vaccine by January 2020, we should not expect it before January 2021. The worst part of this whole saga is that there is no guarantee that these vaccines will work or at least as expected. Bear in mind that human immune virus (HIV) have many lead candidates but yet no viable vaccine now. So all these clinical trials on covid-19 vaccine may end up unsuccessful.

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