How long will it take to develop a coronavirus vaccine?
The clock is ticking to find a vaccine for the coronavirus thats ravaging the world.
The development of a successful vaccine is one of the surest ways of stopping the pandemic in its tracks and enabling millions of people to safely come out of lockdown. The trouble is that its not clear how long that will take — or even if a vaccine can be produced quickly enough to prevent the worst effects of the epidemic.
Researchers and regulators are working to compress the typical six-to-10-year time frame it usually takes for vaccines to get developed, approved and marketed to the public.
U.S. President Donald Trump has proclaimed developing one would take a few months . European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen said it could be on the market before the fall .
Experts estimates are less exaggerated. The European Medicines Agency (EMA) says a vaccineis at least one year away, but even this is optimistic.
“Theres no question about it. Time is not on our side” — Lincoln Tsang, expert in vaccine approval
The truth, according to many public health experts, is that its impossible to predict with much certainty how long it will take before a vaccine is widely available. Whats undeniable is that no matter how much money and expertise are thrown at the effort, or how much regulatory red tape is cut, there are steps of the process that simply cannot be sped up.
“It could be [that] the first vaccine works perfectly … and well get there faster than even I expect,” said Seth Berkley, CEO of Gavi, the Vaccine Alliance. “But I wouldnt want to get peoples hopes up.”
The hope is that lockdowns will slow the spread of the disease, and in the meantime, a vaccine will be deployed that will safely build herd immunity in the population. But in the time it takes to develop, approve and produce a vaccine, the virus might have already spread its way around the globe. Even by the most optimistic estimates, 12 months might be too late.
“Theres no question about it,” said Lincoln Tsang, a partner at the law firm Arnold & Porter and an expert in vaccine approval. “Time is not on our side.”
Coronaviruses, a family of viruses responsible for COVID-19, SARS, MERS and several strains of the common cold, are notoriously difficult to counter. No effort to create a vaccine against a coronavirus in humans has ever succeeded.
One reason is that after outbreaks like SARS and MERS passed, the funding dried up, leaving several promising approaches unfinished.
As soon as the so-called novel coronavirus hit, researchers went back into the labs and dusted off years-old research on coronaviruses that cause SARS and MERS. There are more than 30 vaccines currently in the works.
“You want the proverbial 1,000 flowers bloom moment here,” said Berkley. “You want every potential idea and technology to get started.”
