Hopes grow that a vaccine is almost ready – but there are no guarantees

WE KNOW the Covid-19 vaccine will not be a silver bullet and it will take time to return our lives to normal. But we can cling to the words of WHO director-general Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, who said this week: “We will need vaccines and there is hope that by the end of this year we may have a vaccine. There is hope.”

It was the best piece of news to emerge as we head into a three-week lockdown.

More than 170 teams of researchers are racing to develop a safe and effective vaccine.

In the UK the military would be involved in distribution. Plans are in train for the NHS and armed forces to make the rollout happen.

Detailed plans for the distribution of any successful vaccine have yet to emerge in this country.

The countdown is on to a potential big announcement – but there are no guarantees.

Q: Is there a progress report on the vacccine that Ireland has invested in?

A: The Government has joined in a multimillion euro, EU-wide forward-funding bid to secure early stocks of the experimental Oxford University-Astra Zeneca jab to be shared among member states if it is successful.

It resumed trials in September after a short pause due to a reported side effect in a patient in the UK. The late-stage trials resumed after getting an independent all-clear.

Results are expected at the end of this year or early 2021.

It is involved in Phase 3 testing with 30,000 participants in the US as well as in the UK, Brazil and South Africa.

Late-stage trials resumed after independent all-clear

Q: What about the other candidates?

A: Two other potential vaccines are in large final-phase tests, include one by Moderna in the United States and another that is being trialled by Pfizer and BioNTech.

The Moderna vaccine showed an early result indicating it would trigger an immune response to Covid-19 in 45 injected volunteers.

Pfizer said it was possible the outside board of experts monitoring the trial would find promising signs that the vaccine worked by the end of this year.

About 23,000 volunteers have been enrolled in the phase three trial, which began in July.

Johnson & Johnson is also in the final stage of its clinical trial to determine if its experimental single-dose vaccine can protect against the virus.

The Phase 3 study is one of the world’s largest coronavirus vaccine studies to date.

It involves testing the jab in 60,000 volunteers at more than 200 sites in the US, South Africa, Argentina, Brazil, Chile, Colombia, Mexico and Peru.

It says that if trials prove the inoculation is safe and effective, it could be ready for emergency approval by early 2021.

A successful vaccine would take the pressure off the areas of highest risk but it would be some time before enough volume of the vaccine would be available.