Vaccine may be ready by December
Scientists say early trial shows jab could provide double protection against Covid
HOPES WERE raised last night of a vaccine against coronavirus being available before the end of the year after “very encouraging” preliminary results for a jab that could provide double protection against the disease.
University of Oxford researchers said that an early stage trial of a vaccine against Covid-19 indicated it was safe and produces an immune reaction, with few side effects.
The vaccine also induces strong immune responses in both parts of the immune system – provoking a T cell response within 14 days of vaccination, and an antibody response within 28 days.
The results published yesterday were hailed by experts and the Government, with Health Secretary Matt Hancock declaring the virus was “on the back foot” due to the efforts of the public and those in the front line.
And though scientists say there is still “a long way to go” before the vaccine can be rolled out for general use, the boss of pharmaceutical giant AstraZeneca said he hoped it could be delivered by the end of the year.
Pascal Soriot told reporters said the speed at which it could be developed depended on the infection rate in the community, as a certain number 0f cases are needed to show the drug works, and how long it took for regulators to review the data.
He said: “Our hope is that we can actually start delivering the vaccine before the end of the year, and how early before the end of the year depends really on infection rates in the community.”
Dr Sandy Douglas, who has been working on developing a large-scale manufacturing process for the coronavirus vaccine, said it was “possible” a final version might be available to highrisk groups by the end of the year.
Dr Douglas told a webinar organised by the Science Media Centre: “It won’t be made available to everybody immediately. It is likely to be given to those who have most to benefit from it earliest, and then gradually introduced to other people.” Mr Soriot praised the University of Oxford for the speed it had developed the vaccine, telling reporters that it had been 104 days between the genetic sequencing of the virus to a human trial.
He also said promising results in neutralising antibodies had been seen after two doses were administered in trials, with levels comparable to patients who had recovered from Covid-19.
He said: “The second or booster dose increases your overall antibody response but overall when those two doses (are given), we get very much in the range of what convalescent patients experienced.
“It’s important because here you look at the level of antibodies that are actually neutralising the virus, and what you can see... is with one dose 91 per cent of patients had a neutralising activity against SARS Cov-2 and 100 per cent after two doses of neutralising activity, so very good results.”
Compared with the control group of those given a meningitis vaccine, the Covid-19 vaccine caused minor side effects more frequently, according to the study. But some of these could be reduced by taking paracetamol, the researchers said, adding that there were no serious adverse events from the vaccine.
Co-author Professor Sarah Gilbert, of the University of Oxford, said: “There is still much work to be done before we can confirm if our vaccine will help manage the pandemic, but these early results hold promise. As well as continuing to test our vaccine in phase three trials, we need to learn more about the virus – for example, we still do not know how strong an immune response we need to provoke to effectively protect against Sars-CoV-2 infection.
“If our vaccine is effective, it is a promising option as these types of vaccine can be manufactured at large scale.”