The Race To Develop A Coronavirus Vaccine
How do you quickly develop a safe, effective vaccine in the middle of a historic global pandemic? We’ll ask researchers who are trying to do just that.
Guests
Dr. Dan Barouch, director of the Center for Virology and Vaccine Research at Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center. Professor of medicine at Harvard Medical School. (@BIDMChealth)
Natalie Dean, assistant professor of biostatistics at the University of Florida, specializing in emerging infectious diseases and vaccine study design. (@nataliexdean)
From The Reading List
Vox: ““Human challenge trials,” where healthy volunteers would be exposed to Covid-19, explained” — “As a journalist who covers philanthropy, one of the most frequent questions I get about the coronavirus crisis is how ordinary people can help.”
Washington Post: “How to conduct coronavirus research at pandemic speed” — “Everyone is eager to find a cure for covid-19. Some people — notably President Trump, in his nightly press briefings on the pandemic — have touted the promise of hydroxychloroquine, an old malaria treatment. He’s suggested that patients should take it, asking, ‘What do you have to lose?’”
Boston Globe: “US and J&J commit $1b to coronavirus vaccine codeveloped by Beth Israel” — “The federal government and Johnson & Johnson said Monday that they are investing more than $1 billion in a potential vaccine against the coronavirus, a big bet on a substance developed partly by a laboratory at Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center.”
Bloomberg: “WHO Says 70 Vaccines in the Works, With Three Leading Candidates” — “There are 70 coronavirus vaccines in development globally, with three candidates already being tested in human trials, according to the World Health Organization, as drugmakers race to find a cure for the deadly pathogen.”
NBC News: “Scientist Kizzmekia Corbett leads the way on COVID-19 vaccine trials with dedication and humor” — “The day President Donald Trump went to the National Institutes of Health for an update on progress toward a vaccine for COVID-19, many of those who sat behind the presidential seal with him were white men well known in the worlds of science, medicine and, now, national anxiety control: vaccine and infectious disease specialists like Dr. Anthony Fauci, Dr. John Mascola, Dr. Barney Graham and the man who led the human genome project, Dr. Francis Collins, director of the NIH. Sitting next to Graham was Kizzmekia Corbett, an NIH research fellow.”
STAT: “To restart the economy, employers need to lead the way on Covid-19 testing, vaccination” — “The precise, nationally coordinated campaigns of Covid-19 testing and contact isolation that helped South Korea and Singapore avoid broad lockdowns are conspicuously absent in the United States.”
This article was originally published on WBUR.org. [Copyright 2020 NPR]
