SCIENTISTS START WORK ON VACCINE
CHICAGO/LONDON—WHEN a newly organized vaccine research group at the US National Institutes of Health (NIH) met for the first time this week, its members had expected to be able to ease into their work.
But their mandate is to conduct human trials for emerging health threats—and their first assignment came at shocking speed.
In just three months time, they likely will be testing the first of a number of potential experimental vaccines against the new SARS (Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome)-like coronavirus that is spreading in China and beyond.
”I told them, ‘you are going to have your baptism of fire, folks,’” Anthony Fauci, director of the US National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases within the NIH, said of his inaugural address to the group this week.
The outbreak, which began in the central Chinese city of Wuhan in December, as of Saturday had infected nearly 1,300 people in China and killed 41. Cases have also been confirmed in Thailand, Vietnam, Singapore, Japan, South Korea, Taiwan, Nepal, Malaysia, France, Australia and the United States.
Chinese scientists were able to quickly identify the genetic sequence of the new coronavirus.
With the genetic code in hand, scientists can start vaccine development work. Research groups worldwide are already executing plans to test vaccines, treatments and other countermeasures to stop the newly identified virus.
They are attacking from several angles.
Fauci’s agency is partnering with US biotech Moderna
Inc., which specializes in vaccines based on ribonucleic acid (RNA)—A chemical messenger that contains instructions for making proteins.
That team hopes to make an RNA vaccine based on one of the crown-like spikes on the surface of the coronavirus, an approach that would not expose people to the virus.
‘Molecular clamp’ approach
At the University of Queensland in Australia, scientists backed by the global health emergency group, Coalition for Epidemic Preparedness Innovations, were working on what they described as a “molecular clamp” vaccine approach.
The technology adds a gene to viral proteins to stabilize them and trick the body into thinking it is seeing a live virus and create antibodies against it.
Novavax, which already has a vaccine in development against Middle East Respiratory Syndrome (MERS), says it is now working on one for the Wuhan coronavirus.
Scientists also are turning to infection-fighting proteins known as monoclonal antibodies, or mabs, that were developed against the SARS and MERS coronaviruses.
Vir Biotechnology Chief Scientific Officer Herbert Virgin said his company had a library of monoclonal antibodies that have shown some success against SARS and MERS in lab tests.
Some of these antibodies have been shown to neutralize coronaviruses, Virgin said, and “may have the potential to treat and prevent [the] Wuhan coronavirus.”