<ul class="summary-list"><li>Another leading <keyword id="8624004" type="UNKNOWN" weightage="60" keywordseo="coronavirus-vaccine">coronavirus vaccine</keyword> candidate was able to generate immune responses in healthy volunteers, according to results published Monday. </li><li>It's the first look at human data for <keyword id="6409874" type="COMPANY" weightage="60" keywordseo="astrazeneca">AstraZeneca</keyword>'s <keyword id="24209" type="PERSON" weightage="60" keywordseo="vaccine">vaccine</keyword> candidate, which was originally developed by University of Oxford scientists. </li><li>The early data, published in The Lancet, included results of 543 vaccinated volunteers.</li><li>It's still not clear what level of immune response is needed to protect people from the virus. Larger trials are now underway to determine if the experimental shot prevents infection or disease.</li><li>Vaccine candidates developed by Pfizer and <a href="https://www.businessinsider.com/moderna-coronavirus-vaccine-trial-data-from-humans-niaid-study-nejm-2020-7">Moderna</a> also elicited immune responses in early clinical trials published in July. <a href="https://www.businessinsider.com/coronavirus-vaccine-timeline-what-to-watch-leading-research-2020-3">There are more than 150 vaccine programs underway, and more than 20 are now in human testing.</a></li></ul>The frontrunners in the race for a <keyword id="1754604" type="PERSON" weightage="60" keywordseo="coronavirus">coronavirus</keyword> vaccine have all cleared the first hurdle.In early human testing, vaccine programs led by AstraZeneca, <a href="https://www.businessinsider.com/moderna-lead-in-coronavirus-vaccine-race-threatened-by-pfizer-2020-7">Pfizer</a>, and <a href="https://www.businessinsider.com/moderna-coronavirus-vaccine-trial-data-from-humans-niaid-study-nejm-2020-7">Moderna</a> were all successful in generating immune responses in healthy volunteers. Researchers described each program as generally safe and tolerable, supporting further testing for each shot. Read more: <a href="https://www.businessinsider.com/coronavirus-vaccines-that-could-be-ready-first-moderna-pfizer-oxford-2020-5">We just got a look at promising early data on 2 coronavirus vaccines. Here's how Pfizer, Moderna and AstraZeneca are racing to have their shots ready this fall.</a>AstraZeneca became the latest to release early human data, <a href="https://www.thelancet.com/lancet/article/s0140-6736(20)31604-4">publishing Monday its first clinical results in The Lancet.</a> The vaccine was given to 543 volunteers.But only a few dozen people were tested for neutralizing antibodies, the virus-fighting proteins that play a crucial role in the body's immune response. A month after receiving a dose of the vaccine, 32 of 35 people had these proteins.Ten volunteers also tried a two-dose regimen that included a booster shot. All 10 people recorded neutralizing antibodies, and the vaccine's leading researchers emphasized these limited results. "We saw the strongest immune response in participants who received two doses of the vaccine, indicating that this might be a good strategy for vaccination," said Andrew Pollard, co-author of the trial. AstraZeneca will likely prioritize the testing of a two-dose regimen in late-stage trials, company executives said on a Monday call with reporters.The researchers reported no serious side effects from the vaccine, but 70% of the vaccinated volunteers experienced fatigue and 68% had headaches, higher rates than a control group given a meningitis vaccine. Other common side effects included muscle ache, malaise, chills, and fever.The study was limited to young and healthy people. The median age was 35 and 91% of volunteers were white. "There is still much work to be done before we can confirm if our vaccine will help manage the COVID-19 pandemic, but these early results hold promise," University of Oxford Professor Sara Gilbert said in a statement Monday. Read more: <a href="https://www.businessinsider.com/wuhan-coronavirus-treatments-vaccine-jj-regeneron-gilead-2020-2">How 13 top drugmakers are sprinting to develop a coronavirus vaccine or treatment that can halt this pandemic</a><h2>The positive early results still don't determine if the vaccine works</h2>It's not clear what level of immune response will protect people from the virus. Large-scale trials, enrolling tens of thousands of people, are now underway to test AstraZeneca's vaccine <a href="https://www.cbsnews.com/news/coronavirus-vaccine-trial-oxford-expands-south-africa-brazil/">in the UK, South Africa, and Brazil</a>.AstraZeneca CEO Pascal Soriot said the British pharma is aiming to start a 30,000-person US-based trial in late July or early August. The UK study will likely be the first trial to produce efficacy results, with Soriot estimating that trial will produce results this fall, potentially as early as September.These final tests will determine if the vaccine can actually prevent infections or disease, comparing vaccinated volunteers against a group receiving a placebo. Moderna is planning to start its final stage of testing on July 27, and Pfizer executives said they are also hoping to launch its pivotal study this month. Additional vaccine candidates led by Johnson &amp; Johnson and Novavax are aiming to start these large efficacy trials this fall.All these programs are pursuing an unprecedented timeline in vaccine development. It typically takes multiple year to craft a vaccine, test it in trials, and manufacture the shot at scale. Given the urgency of the pandemic, drugmakers have been closely working with world governments to shorten that process to a matter of months.AstraZeneca, Pfizer, and Moderna have all said they are hoping <a href="https://www.businessinsider.com/coronavirus-vaccines-that-could-be-ready-first-moderna-pfizer-oxford-2020-5">to be ready as soon as this fall for potential emergency use of their vaccines</a>. Their vaccines would be greatly limited in quantity, and it's unclear how much clinical data would be available to support a regulatory decision that soon.Read more: <a href="https://www.businessinsider.com/moderna-lead-in-coronavirus-vaccine-race-threatened-by-pfizer-2020-7">Moderna's lead in the coronavirus vaccine race is slipping. Here's how pharma giants like Pfizer are threatening the biotech's front-runner status.</a><h2>Oxford scientists developed the shot to avoid pre-existing immunity concerns</h2>The shot was developed by University of Oxford scientists. They rigged a chimpanzee version of the common cold virus, called the adenovirus, to carry the spike protein, a critical element of the novel coronavirus. Scientists used a chimp version of the virus to <a href="https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC6963200/">avoid any concerns of pre-existing immunity</a> to the adenovirus.This issue flared up for another early coronavirus vaccine candidate developed by the Chinese biotech CanSino Biologics. That program used a human adenovirus, and about half of the human volunteers had pre-existing immunity to that virus. This weakened the immune response to the vaccine, <a href="https://www.thelancet.com/journals/lancet/article/PIIS0140-6736(20)31208-3/fulltext">according to clinical results published in May.</a>AstraZeneca joined in on the effort in late-April, and has supercharged its manufacturing and testing strategy. That has included <a href="https://www.hhs.gov/about/news/2020/05/21/trump-administration-accelerates-astrazeneca-covid-19-vaccine-to-be-available-beginning-in-october.html">inking a $1.2 billion deal</a> with the US government, <a href="https://www.astrazeneca.com/media-centre/press-releases/2020/astrazeneca-to-supply-europe-with-up-to-400-million-doses-of-oxford-universitys-vaccine-at-no-profit.html">supplying up to 400 million doses to Europe at no profit</a>, and <a href="https://www.astrazeneca.com/media-centre/press-releases/2020/astrazeneca-takes-next-steps-towards-broad-and-equitable-access-to-oxford-universitys-covid-19-vaccine.html">reaching agreements with global nonprofits</a> to distribute its shot to low- and middle-income countries.

The first human data from AstraZeneca and Oxford's coronavirus vaccine shows an immune response, a positive sign the shot might work

By Shakoor Rather(Eds: Recasting overnight story) New Delhi, Apr 16 () Six Indian companies are working on a vaccine for COVID-19, joining global efforts to find a quick preventive for the deadly infection spreading rapidly across the world, says a top Indian scientist.Nearly 70 'vaccine candidates' are being tested and at least three have moved to the human clinical trial stage, but a vaccine for the novel coronavirus is unlikely to be ready for mass use before 2021. As COVID-19 infects more than 1.9 million in the world and claims 1,26,000 lives, Indian scientists are also part of the global fight against the disease. "While Zydus Cadila is working on two vaccines, Serum Institute, Biological E, Bharat Biotech, Indian Immunologicals, and Mynvax are developing one vaccine each," Gagandeep Kang, executive director of the Translational Health Science and Technology Institute, Faridabad, told .Kang is also vice chair of the Coalition for Epidemic Preparedness Innovations (CEPI), which noted in a recent study that the "global vaccine R&amp;D effort in response to the COVID-19 pandemic is unprecedented in terms of scale and speed". But it is a complicated process with many stages of testing and many challenges, explained experts. A vaccine for the new coronavirus, SARS-CoV-2, may not take 10 years that other vaccines do but it could be at least a year before it is proven safe, effective, and made widely available, they said."Vaccine development is a lengthy process which often takes years, with many challenges," said E. Sreekumar, chief scientific officer at the Rajiv Gandhi Centre for Biotechnology (RGCB) in Kerala. "Generally, vaccines take several months to pass the different stages of testing, and then approvals also take time. For COVID-19, we don't expect a vaccine to come in this year," agreed Rakesh Mishra, director of the CSIR-Centre for Cellular and Molecular Biology (CCMB) in Hyderabad. Vaccine testing typically begins with animal and lab testing before going on to different stages of human testing. "The human testing phase is composed of many phases," Sreekumar told . "Phase one trials are small-scale, usually involving few participants, to assess whether the vaccine is safe for humans. Phase two trials often involve several hundred subjects, and mainly evaluate the efficacy of the vaccine against the disease," he said. The final phase involves thousands of people to further assess the efficacy of the vaccine over a defined period of time, and can last several months, Sreekumar said. "That is why we don't see a vaccine coming in at least a year from now." Even after the vaccine is ready, he explained, there are a lot of challenges, including whether the vaccine is effective in all populations, and if it can be used for different strains of the novel coronavirus, which might start mutating as time passes."There are lots of vaccines which are being tested for COVID-19, some of which are in the stage 1 clinical trial," Mishra added. "But we still don't know how fast they will proceed towards a vaccine and they can take several months to reach any point," he said. According to the World Health Organization (WHO), three vaccine candidates are in the clinical testing phase, meaning they are able to be tested on humans, while nearly 70 are in the preclinical phase -- either in lab testing, or animal studies. Though Kang named six companies, the WHO has listed only Zydus Cadila and Serum Institute from India as among the global firms working on a COVID-19 vaccine. As of April 8, 2020, said CEPI, the global COVID-19 vaccine R&amp;D landscape includes 115 vaccine candidates, of which 78 are confirmed as active and 37 are unconfirmed. Of the 78 confirmed active projects, 73 are currently at exploratory or preclinical stages, noted the CEPI team in an analysis published in the journal Nature reviews drug Discovery last week. The most advanced candidates have recently moved into clinical development, including mRNA-1273 from US-based biotechnology company Moderna, Ad5-nCoV from Chinese biopharma company CanSino Biologicals, and INO-4800 from American pharmaceuticals company Inovio.Others in this list include LV-SMENP-DC and pathogen-specific aAPC from Shenzhen Geno-Immune Medical Institute in China.Numerous other vaccine developers have indicated plans to initiate human testing in 2020, the CEPI scientists said.Experts believe the genome sequencing of the new coronavirus provided by scientists in China shows it shares 79 per cent of the same genetic material as severe acute respiratory syndrome (SARS) and 50 per cent of the same material as Middle East respiratory syndrome (MERS), a species of coronavirus which infects humans, bats, and camels. This allows developers to use groundwork already created in research for vaccines for those viruses. Australia's national science agency CSIRO announced earlier this month that it has begun preclinical tests of a vaccine developed by Oxford University in the UK. A striking feature of the vaccine development landscape for COVID-19 is the range of technology platforms being evaluated, including nucleic acid (DNA and RNA), virus-like particle, live weakened virus, and inactivated virus approaches. The CEPI noted that many of these platforms are not currently the basis for licensed vaccines, but experience in fields such as oncology is encouraging developers to exploit the opportunities that next-generation approaches offer for increased speed of development and manufacture. SAR MIN DVDV

Six Indian companies working on vaccine for COVID-19

Washington, May 4 (AP) Hundreds of people are rolling up their sleeves in countries across the world to be injected with experimental vaccines that might stop COVID-19, spurring hope - maybe unrealistic - that an end to the pandemic may arrive sooner than anticipated.About 100 research groups are pursuing vaccines with nearly a dozen in early stages of human trials or poised to start. It's a crowded field, but researchers say that only increases the odds that a few might overcome the many obstacles that remain."We're not really in a competition against each other. We're in a race against a pandemic virus, and we really need as many players in that race as possible," Dr. Andrew Pollard, who is leading the University of Oxford's vaccine study, told The Associated Press.The hard truth: There's no way to predict which - if any - vaccine will work safely, or even to name a front-runner.As Dr. Anthony Fauci, the U.S. government's top expert, put it: "You need more shots on goal for a chance at getting a safe and effective vaccine." The first cautious tests of March, when small numbers of volunteers got injections to check for side effects, have turned into larger studies in China, the U.S. and Europe to look for hints that different vaccine candidates really protect.Next: Finding out for sure if any of the vaccines work in the real world by testing large groups of people in areas where the virus is circulating - a tricky prospect when study participants may be in places where the virus is fading or they are told to stay home - and finding a way to quickly distribute lots of doses of any successful candidates.Policymakers are devising plans to try to overcome both obstacles in an attempt to compress the years it usually takes to develop a vaccine. Asked if a vaccine by January was possible, Dr. Deborah Birx, the White House coronavirus task force coordinator, told Fox News Sunday "on paper, it's possible. It's whether we can execute," she said.Fauci has cautioned that even if everything goes perfectly, 12 to 18 months to develop a vaccine would set a speed record - and January will mark a year since the National Institutes of Health began creating its own COVID-19 vaccine, now in trials with Moderna Inc.Depending how you count, there are between eight and 11 vaccine candidates in early stages of testing in China, the U.S., Britain and Germany - a collaboration between Pfizer Inc. and BioNTech last week began a study in Germany that's simultaneously testing four somewhat different shots. More study sites are about to open in still other countries - and between May and July another handful of different vaccines is set to begin first-in-human testing.There's no shortage of volunteers."This allows me to play a small role in fighting this thing," said Anthony Campisi, 33, of Philadelphia, who received his first test dose of Inovio Pharmaceuticals' DNA-based vaccine at the University of Pennsylvania last month. "I can be a guinea pig." The initial vaccine candidates work in a variety of ways. That's important because if one type fails, maybe another won't.Different types of vaccines work better in some virus families than others. But for coronaviruses, there's no blueprint. Back in 2003 when scientists attempted vaccines against SARS, a cousin of the new virus, animal studies hinted at safety problems but then SARS disappeared and vaccine funding dried up. Vaccines against another COVID-19 cousin named MERS have only reached first-step safety testing."In 20/20 hindsight, we should have worked harder on coronavirus vaccines back then," said Dr. Sten Vermund, dean of the Yale School of Public Health. Now, "we're obligated to try a variety of strategies if we want fast results."China's Sinovac and SinoPharm are testing "inactivated" vaccines, made by growing the new coronavirus and killing it. The companies have revealed little information about how the shots differ. But the technology is tried-and-true - polio shots and some types of flu vaccine are inactivated virus - although it's hard to scale up to rapidly produce millions of doses.Most other vaccines in the pipeline aim to train the immune system to recognize a piece of the new coronavirus - mostly, the spiky protein that studs its outer surface.One way: Use a harmless virus to carry the spike protein into the body. It's easier to produce but determining which virus is the best "carrier" is a key question. China's CanSino Biologics brewed its vaccine using a common cold-causing adenovirus, engineered so it won't spread in the body. And in case people's immune systems fight off the cold virus before the vaccine can do its job, Pollard's Oxford team instead chose an adenovirus that normally infects chimpanzees.Another way: Inject a piece of the coronavirus genetic code that instructs the body itself to produce spike protein that in turn primes the immune system to attack. It's a new and unproven technology but one that promises even faster production. Vaccines made by NIH and Moderna, Inovio Pharmaceuticals, and that Pfizer-BioNtech collaboration use genetic code approaches.Still more methods are next in line: Vaccine made of spike protein nanoparticles, and even a nasal spray alternative to shots.Most vaccine studies so far are tracking safety and whether volunteers' blood shows any immune reactions. Some have jumped to larger numbers quickly, but there's still concern about being able to prove real-world protection. (AP) RS RS

COVID-19 vaccine hunt heats up globally, still no guarantee

<ul class="summary-list"><li>Vladimir <keyword id="6355086" type="UNKNOWN" weightage="60" keywordseo="Putin">Putin</keyword> <a href="https://www.businessinsider.com/putin-russia-has-coronavirus-vaccine-daughter-despite-concerns-development-2020-8">announced on Tuesday</a> that <keyword id="6358826" type="LOCATION" weightage="60" keywordseo="Russia">Russia</keyword> had approved the first experimental <keyword id="1754604" type="PERSON" weightage="60" keywordseo="coronavirus">coronavirus</keyword> <keyword id="24209" type="PERSON" weightage="60" keywordseo="vaccine">vaccine</keyword> for widespread use.</li><li>The vaccine, called Sputnik V, hasn't gone through a phase 3 trial, so experts warn it may not be <a href="https://www.businessinsider.com/putin-russia-has-coronavirus-vaccine-daughter-despite-concerns-development-2020-8">safe or effective</a>.</li><li>Russia's health ministry plans to start mass producing the vaccine in the fall. </li></ul>Russian President Vladimir Putin <a href="https://www.interfax.ru/russia/721241">announced on Tuesday</a> that the country's health ministry has approved a coronavirus vaccine for widespread emergency use.One of his daughters already got it, Putin added, <a href="https://www.businessinsider.com/putin-russia-has-coronavirus-vaccine-daughter-despite-concerns-development-2020-8">with minimal side effects</a>. In a government meeting, Putin vouched for the safety and efficacy of the vaccine, which is named Sputnik V after the Soviet Union's orbital satellite. He also congratulated its developers, the Gamaleya Institute in Moscow and the Russian Ministry of Defence."We must be grateful to those who took this first step, very important for our country, in general for the whole world," Putin said, according to <a href="https://www.interfax.ru/russia/721241">Russian news site Interfax</a>.Russia's health ministry hopes to start mass producing the vaccine by <a href="https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2020-08-10/russian-covid-19-vaccine-is-pandora-s-box-industry-body-warns">October</a> and plans to offer the first doses to essential workers like teachers and healthcare professionals. But the announcement was met with skepticism from experts around the world as well as an independent Russian pharmaceutical organization, which suggested that the nation rushed vaccine production for political reasons. Because developers haven't released results of early trials or begun advanced ones, many immunologists worry that people could suffer dangerous side effects.Here's what the Russian government says about Sputnik V, versus what the data shows so far.<h2>The vaccine might not be safe or effective</h2>Russia's vaccine introduces bits of coronavirus protein through an adenovirus, a relatively harmless virus <a href="https://www.cdc.gov/adenovirus/index.html">associated with the common cold</a>. In theory, this should train the immune system to produce antibodies that respond to the coronavirus, theoretically generating protection against infection.Putin is calling Sputnik V the "world's first" coronavirus vaccine, but that doesn't mean it's the first to be proven safe and effective. <div type="image" title="sputnik v" height="3044" width="4555" msid="77495027" hostid="261"></div>Sputnik V is one of more than two dozen vaccine candidates worldwide that have completed or are in the middle of phase 1 and 2 trials, <a href="https://www.biocentury.com/clinical-vaccines-and-therapies">according to Biocentury</a>. These early tests typically involve giving the drug to small groups of volunteers to ensure that a vaccine candidate generates an antibody response and is generally safe. Sputnik V's phase 1 and 2 trials involved 76 participants in total, <a href="https://clinicaltrials.gov/ct2/show/NCT04436471">according to records</a> in the US National Library of Medicine. All <a href="https://www.nature.com/articles/d41586-020-02386-2">38 participants</a> who received either one or two doses in one of those trials produced antibodies. Side effects were mostly mild; they included elevated temperatures and headaches, which is similar to the findings of other vaccine trials. But experts caution that Sputnik V's early trial results have not undergone peer review, and that its developers have not released details that could help researchers evaluate the trials' quality, like their full methodology and results. The vaccine also hasn't begun its most crucial and major trial yet.<h2>The vaccine is being administered before its phase 3 trial</h2>Putin said on Tuesday that Sputnik V is ready for widespread citizen use."I repeat: It has passed all the necessary tests," he said.But according to the traditional standards of clinical trials, that isn't true. The vaccine has yet to complete its phase 3 trial, a crucial step that measures a candidate's effectiveness in a large population and can uncover rarer side effects. Phase 3 usually tests a vaccine's safety and efficacy on thousands of people across multiple locations."Not sure what Russia is up to, but I certainly would not take a vaccine that hasn't been tested in phase III. Nobody knows if it's safe or if it works. They are putting HCWs [health care workers] and their population at risk," Florian Krammer, an immunologist at Mount Sinai's Icahn School of Medicine, <a href="https://twitter.com/florian_krammer/status/1293143496900182017">wrote in a tweet</a>. Kirill Dmitriev, chief executive of the Russian Direct Investment Fund, which bankrolled the vaccine, said advanced clinical trials are slated to begin Wednesday and test "several thousand people" across multiple countries, including the United Arab Emirates and Saudi Arabia. <div type="image" title="russia coronavirus vaccine" height="1610" width="2415" msid="77495028" hostid="261"></div>But phase 3 trials are most often where many promising treatments falter. A <a href="https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/27723879/">2016 study</a> of 640 <a href="https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC6092479/">phase 3 trials</a> in the US found that 344 failed — around 54%. <a href="https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/24449316/">Another study</a> found that of 302 new drug applications submitted to the FDA after phase 3 trials, 50% were initially rejected. Nearly half of the rejected drugs were ultimately approved, however.Globally, at least six other vaccine candidates — made by Sinovac, Sinopharm, Pfizer and BioNTech, the University of Oxford with AstraZeneca, and Moderna — have reached phase 3 trials, according to the <a href="https://www.who.int/publications/m/item/draft-landscape-of-covid-19-candidate-vaccines">World Health Organization</a>. A seventh, made by CanSino Biologics, will soon begin a phase 3 trial in Saudi Arabia, <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2020/science/coronavirus-vaccine-tracker.html#cansino">according to the New York Times</a>.<h2>Russia's Health Ministry says the vaccine could provide 2 years of immunity</h2>The Russian Health Ministry said on Tuesday that the vaccine is expected to provide immunity from the coronavirus for up to two years. But researchers <a href="https://www.theatlantic.com/ideas/archive/2020/07/could-covid-19-immunity-really-disappear-months/614377/">don't yet know</a> how long <keyword id="8763838" type="UNKNOWN" weightage="60" keywordseo="covid-19">COVID-19</keyword> antibodies protect people from reinfection. So it's difficult to say how long an antibody-based vaccine could provide immunity, and it may take a while for scientists figure that out. Researchers are still learning about how long mumps and yellow fever vaccines last, and those have been around for decades.The duration of vaccine-based immunity overall can still be mysterious, Bali Pulendran, an immunologist at Stanford University, <a href="https://www.sciencemag.org/news/2019/04/how-long-do-vaccines-last-surprising-answers-may-help-protect-people-longer">told Science Magazine</a> in 2019."I keep saying, 'It's not well understood, it's not well understood,'" he said. "This is one of the major issues in vaccines."<h2>A top Russian pharmaceutical organization urged officials to halt Sputnik V</h2>A prominent pharmaceutical organization in Russia, the Association of Clinical Trials, urged the Russian Ministry of Health to delay registration of the vaccine <a href="http://acto-russia.org/index.php?option=com_content&amp;task=view&amp;id=411p;id=411">in a letter published on its website</a> on Monday. "This is a new vaccine, it has not yet completed testing with even hundreds of people, not to mention several thousand participants in the study in phase III," the organization wrote.The letter also said developers had failed to follow "the gold standard" of randomized, double-blind, placebo-controlled clinical trials, instead trying to act according to a "heroic paradigm" at the expense of citizens' safety. "Unfortunately, the role of heroes in this case is assigned to those who did not plan to play it at all — ordinary citizens of Russia who are at risk for COVID-19," the letter said.

Russia has approved a coronavirus vaccine without widespread testing. Medical experts warn it could be dangerous.

By Shakoor Rather New Delhi, Apr 15 () Six Indian companies are working on a vaccine for COVID-19, joining the global race against time to find a preventive for the deadly infection spreading rapidly across the world, says a top Indian scientist.Nearly 70 'vaccine candidates' are being tested and at least three have moved to the human clinical trial stage, but a vaccine for the novel coronavirus is unlikely to be ready for mass use before 2021. As COVID-19 infects more than 1.9 million in the world and claims 1,26,000 lives, Indian scientists are also part of the global fight against the disease. "While Zydus Cadila is working on two vaccines, Serum Institute, Biological E, Bharat Biotech, Indian Immunologicals, and Mynvax are developing one vaccine each," Gagandeep Kang, executive director of the Translational Health Science and Technology Institute, Faridabad, told .Kang is also vice chair of the Coalition for Epidemic Preparedness Innovations (CEPI), which noted in a recent study that the "global vaccine R&amp;D effort in response to the COVID-19 pandemic is unprecedented in terms of scale and speed". But it is a complicated process with many stages of testing and many challenges, explained experts. A vaccine for the new coronavirus, SARS-CoV-2, may not take 10 years that other vaccines do but it could be at least a year before it is proven safe, effective, and made widely available, they said."Vaccine development is a lengthy process which often takes years, with many challenges," said E. Sreekumar, chief scientific officer at the Rajiv Gandhi Centre for Biotechnology (RGCB) in Kerala. "Generally, vaccines take several months to pass the different stages of testing, and then approvals also take time. For COVID-19, we don't expect a vaccine to come in this year," agreed Rakesh Mishra, director of the CSIR-Centre for Cellular and Molecular Biology (CCMB) in Hyderabad. Vaccine testing typically begins with animal and lab testing before going on to different stages of human testing. "The human testing phase is composed of many phases," Sreekumar told . "Phase one trials are small-scale, usually involving few participants, to assess whether the vaccine is safe for humans. Phase two trials often involve several hundred subjects, and mainly evaluate the efficacy of the vaccine against the disease," he said. The final phase involves thousands of people to further assess the efficacy of the vaccine over a defined period of time, and can last several months, Sreekumar said. "That is why we don't see a vaccine coming in at least a year from now." Even after the vaccine is ready, he explained, there are a lot of challenges, including whether the vaccine is effective in all populations, and if it can be used for different strains of the novel coronavirus, which might start mutating as time passes."There are lots of vaccines which are being tested for COVID-19, some of which are in the stage 1 clinical trial," Mishra added. "But we still don't know how fast they will proceed towards a vaccine and they can take several months to reach any point," he said. According to the World Health Organization (WHO), three vaccine candidates are in the clinical testing phase, meaning they are able to be tested on humans, while nearly 70 are in the preclinical phase -- either in lab testing, or animal studies. Though Kang named six companies, the WHO has listed only Zydus Cadila and Serum Institute from India as among the global firms working on a COVID-19 vaccine. As of April 8, 2020, said CEPI, the global COVID-19 vaccine R&amp;D landscape includes 115 vaccine candidates, of which 78 are confirmed as active and 37 are unconfirmed. Of the 78 confirmed active projects, 73 are currently at exploratory or preclinical stages, noted the CEPI team in an analysis published in the journal Nature reviews drug Discovery last week. The most advanced candidates have recently moved into clinical development, including mRNA-1273 from US-based biotechnology company Moderna, Ad5-nCoV from Chinese biopharma company CanSino Biologicals, and INO-4800 from American pharmaceuticals company Inovio.Others in this list include LV-SMENP-DC and pathogen-specific aAPC from Shenzhen Geno-Immune Medical Institute in China.Numerous other vaccine developers have indicated plans to initiate human testing in 2020, the CEPI scientists said.Experts believe the genome sequencing of the new coronavirus provided by scientists in China shows it shares 79 per cent of the same genetic material as severe acute respiratory syndrome (SARS) and 50 per cent of the same material as Middle East respiratory syndrome (MERS), a species of coronavirus which infects humans, bats, and camels. This allows developers to use groundwork already created in research for vaccines for those viruses. Australia's national science agency CSIRO announced earlier this month that it has begun preclinical tests of a vaccine developed by Oxford University in the UK. A striking feature of the vaccine development landscape for COVID-19 is the range of technology platforms being evaluated, including nucleic acid (DNA and RNA), virus-like particle, live weakened virus, and inactivated virus approaches. The CEPI noted that many of these platforms are not currently the basis for licensed vaccines, but experience in fields such as oncology is encouraging developers to exploit the opportunities that next-generation approaches offer for increased speed of development and manufacture. It is conceivable that some vaccine platforms may be better suited to specific population subtypes such as the elderly, children, pregnant women, or immunocompromised patients, noted Sreekumar. The CEPI analysis shows most COVID-19 vaccine development activity is in North America, with 36 (46 per cent) developers of the confirmed active vaccine candidates compared with 14 ( per cent) in China, 14 (18 per cent) in Asia (excluding China) and Australia, and 14 (18 per cent) in Europe. "Given the imperative for speed, there is an indication that vaccine could be available under emergency use or similar protocols by early 2021," it said. This would represent a fundamental change from the traditional vaccine development pathway, which takes on an average over 10 years, even compared with the accelerated five-year timescale for development of the first Ebola vaccine, the organisation said."Although there is a lot of enthusiasm, but it will take its own course to bring out a vaccine for COVID-19," Mishra added. SAR MIN MINMIN

Six Indian companies working on COVID-19 vaccine, many challenges in finding a preventive: experts

<img src="https://static-ssl.businessinsider.com/image/5e85db0a2d41c145e0664717-2400/bearwalkmoderna077.jpg" alt="Moderna lab facilities biotech" />ModernaTablets allow Moderna employees to monitor daily operations.<ul class="summary-list"><li>The upstart biotech Moderna believes it can have a coronavirus vaccine ready for emergency use this fall.</li><li>Business Insider spoke Wednesday with the company's founder and chairman, Noubar Afeyan, about the ambitious plan to get to that point. </li><li>A small trial testing the vaccine in humans is ongoing. Moderna CEO Stephane Bancel expects that study to start producing data this spring.</li><li>Moderna will run additional trials to test the vaccine in more people, while building out its manufacturing power to produce millions of doses each month.</li><li><a href="https://www.businessinsider.com/?hprecirc-bullet">Visit Business Insider's homepage for more stories</a>.</li></ul>With many public health experts warning for the potential of a second coronavirus outbreak in the fall, one biotechnology company is aiming to have a vaccine ready for emergency use by then.The first human trial of the experimental vaccine, from the biotech Moderna, is already underway. CEO Stephane Bancel laid out the next steps for testing the vaccine, as well as ramping up production, in <a href="https://cap.csail.mit.edu/members/events-professional-programs/dealing-coronavirus-industry-perspective">an MIT lecture series</a> on Wednesday.Business Insider spoke on Wednesday with Noubar Afeyan, the chairman and co-founder of Moderna, about what comes next for the biotech's vaccine. Afeyan is founder and CEO of the Boston biotech VC firm Flagship Pioneering, which helped start Moderna.Together, the two Moderna leaders shared an ambitious strategy aimed at having a vaccine ready by the fall. Vaccines can take years to develop, and they're shortening the timeline significantly.Moderna is far from alone in the sprint to develop a vaccine. Pharma giants like Johnson &amp; Johnson, Sanofi, and Pfizer have vaccine projects, as do a wide range of small biotechs.Read more: <a href="https://www.businessinsider.com/jj-coronavirus-vaccine-interview-timetable-testing-manufacturing-2020-3">The top scientist at J&amp;J told us how the $350 billion pharma giant will have a coronavirus vaccine ready at 'warp speed', then pump out 1 billion doses</a>But Moderna is the leader out of the gate, as one of only two companies to have started human testing. The other is a Chinese biotech called CanSino Biologics.<h2>Moderna expects human data to start coming in the spring, with more studies rapidly following</h2>Right now, researchers in Atlanta and Seattle are recruiting healthy volunteers to participate in the first clinical trial of Moderna's vaccine. That study is trying three dose strengths - 25 micrograms, 100 micrograms, and 250 micrograms - in 45 people. Bancel said he expects to get data about the vaccine's safety in the spring. Additional data showing how well the vaccine triggers an immune response, known as immunogenicity, should come in the late spring or early summer, the CEO added. Read more: <a href="https://www.businessinsider.com/moderna-coronavirus-vaccine-development-inside-the-lab-ceo-interview-2020-3">'Crazy hours, short nights': The inside story of how a buzzy biotech upstart developed a potential coronavirus vaccine in record time</a>This first study of the vaccine is called a Phase 1 trial, and is aimed at determining whether the vaccine is safe for people to get. Drug development is divided into three phases, and these trials are usually done sequentially, with each study informing the design of the next one. But the pandemic's urgency has Moderna eyeing a quicker approach.The biotech wants to start a Phase 2 study in late spring. In order to do this, the biotech will design the study based solely off of the safety results and plans to test multiple dose strengths, according to the CEO."We do not expect to wait for the immunogenicity data," Bancel said, adding the motivation is to shorten the testing timeframe as much as possible. A Phase 3 trial will start in the summer or early fall, Bancel said. That will start after there is immunogenicity data that can guide the design, particularly on the best dose to use going forward. Afeyan acknowledged the unknowns surrounding the vaccine and these future trials, but said the pandemic requires urgency."There's a lot of things that we don't know about this disease," Afeyan said, later adding, "That may be problematic as we enter advanced clinical trials. We just don't know what we don't know. But the need is such, and the technology is efficient and testable enough that we thought we had to do this." Read more: <a href="https://www.businessinsider.com/coronavirus-vaccine-timeline-what-to-watch-leading-research-2020-3">There are more than 40 potential coronavirus vaccines in the works. Here are the top efforts to watch, including the 8 vaccines set to be tested in people this year.</a> <h2>Manufacturing is revving up, with plans for 24/7 production</h2>Moderna is now making vaccine doses for the Phase 2 and 3 studies, even without having seen any in-human data for the candidate. Bancel said his team just ordered new equipment to build out its plant in Norwood, Massachusetts. The company is hiring and training more workers to soon have the plant up and running 24/7. The short-term goal is to produce millions of doses per month and get to dozens of millions per month in 2021, he said. This hinges on a huge unknown: what dose strength will be needed. The first trial is testing a low dose of 25 micrograms and a high dose of 250 micrograms - a 10-times difference in strength and material needed. The US Biomedical Advanced Research and Development Authority (BARDA) <a href="https://www.hhs.gov/about/news/2020/03/30/hhs-accelerates-clinical-trials-prepares-manufacturing-covid-19-vaccines.html">said Monday</a> it is providing an undisclosed amount of funding to Moderna to boost its vaccine manufacturing capabilities. "That will gives us resources to scale up and advance enough to be in a position to make large quantities come this fall," Afeyan said on the BARDA agreement. "And then the question will be what is the status of the crisis and what does the data suggest as it relates to any consideration for emergency use." While Afeyan declined to provide a specific estimate on the number of doses Moderna could have available in the fall in an emergency, he said "it would be commensurate with the need." Additionally, Moderna is considering adding additional sites in the US and outside the US to build supply for other countries and markets, Afeyan said.<h2>A commercially-available vaccine is still at least a year out</h2>While Moderna is acknowledging the potential for an emergency use of its vaccine in the fall, Afeyan said the timeline for bringing its vaccine to market as an FDA-approved product is in line with the 12 to 18 months timeline. On commercial pricing, Bancel <a href="https://www.businessinsider.com/moderna-ceo-stephane-bancel-interview-coronavirus-vaccine-price-2020-3">previously told Business Insider</a> in March that they will set a reasonable price for its vaccine.On Wednesday, he compared vaccine pricing to what we are currently seeing for diagnostic testing: free to the end consumer, with insurers and governments picking up the bill. Thinking further ahead, another critical unknown is how this novel coronavirus may change over time, with researchers already noticing some mutations. Moderna's vaccine, along with most of the other vaccine research efforts, is targeting the spike protein of the coronavirus. Bancel said researchers are closely watching to see if there are any mutations to that protein, which could cause a vaccine to lose some efficacy. But the CEO also said Moderna is well-suited to make quick changes to its vaccine, given its technology. He recalled it took 42 days to go from sequencing the virus' genetics to shipping a vaccine to US health officials. "I believe we can go faster," he said.<a href="/intelligence/digital-health?IR=T&amp;itm_source=businessinsider&amp;itm_medium=ctgr_bii&amp;itm_term=ctgr_subscription&amp;itm_content=health&amp;itm_campaign=digital-health"><img src="https://static.businessinsider.com/image/5cf6b11111e205471c5718a4" alt="Digital Health Pro" style="width: 100% !important" /></a> Featured Health Articles: - <a href="/telehealth-industry-explained">Telehealth Industry Explained</a> - <a href="/value-based-care-pay-for-performance-healthcare-model">Value-Based Care Explained</a> - <a href="/senior-care-market-trends">Senior Care &amp; Assisted Living Market</a> - <a href="/wearable-technology-healthcare-medical-devices">Smart Medical Devices &amp; Wearable Tech</a> - <a href="/artificial-intelligence-healthcare">AI in Healthcare</a> - <a href="/remote-patient-monitoring-industry-explained">Remote Patient Monitoring Explained</a>- <a href="/ai-medical-diagnosis-report">AI in Medical Diagnosis Systems</a> <h3>NOW WATCH: <a href="https://www.businessinsider.com/coronavirus-vaccine-development-timeline-moderna-2020-3">Drugmakers are developing coronavirus vaccines in record time - but it will still be months before one is available</a></h3> <iframe class="bijwplayerclass" src="https://content.jwplatform.com/players/AkNVpKS2-CEZHWCBG.html" width="100%" height="100%" frameborder="0" scrolling="auto" style="margin:0px;"></iframe>

The upstart biotech Moderna is aiming to have its coronavirus vaccine ready for emergency use in the fall. Here's how they plan to execute in record time.

<ul><li>Everybody, including the <keyword id="46535" type="COMPANY" weightage="20" keywordseo="Health-ministry">Health Ministry</keyword>, seems clueless on how to tackle and contain this monstrous surge. </li><li>Most experts are now convinced that this Indian variant, B.1.617, is far more contagious than earlier strains and may be resistant to existing <keyword id="79555" type="TECHNOLOGY" weightage="20" keywordseo="Vaccines">vaccines</keyword>. </li><li>Put simply, the game has changed, and a successful global rollout of current vaccines by itself is no longer a guarantee of victory. </li></ul>The relentless march of Covid’s second wave in India continues. The daily case count has gone beyond 200,000 cases per day. Everybody, including the Health Ministry, seems clueless on how to tackle and contain this monstrous surge. The nervousness of the current establishment reflects in their somewhat knee-jerk reaction to give a <a href="https://www.thequint.com/coronavirus/fast-tracking-covid-vaccines-granted-eua-in-other-nations-centre">go-ahead signal</a> to all foreign-produced <keyword id="8763838" type="UNKNOWN" weightage="20" keywordseo="covid-19">COVID-19</keyword> vaccines that have been granted Emergency Use Authorization (EUA) in other countries. National Expert Group on Vaccine Administration for COVID-19 (NEGVAC) has already given <a href="https://www.livemint.com/news/india/centre-paves-way-to-have-more-foreign-produced-covid-19-vaccines-in-india-11618306108947.html">EUA</a> to a Russian viral vector vaccine <keyword id="9747628" type="UNKNOWN" weightage="20" keywordseo="Sputnik-V">Sputnik-V</keyword> by Gamaleya Institute a couple of days back. Another vector vaccine, Johnson &amp; Johnson’s (JNJ’s) Adenovirus 26 (Adv26), is on the verge of getting the health ministry’s nod. Already, two Covid vaccines, Covishield and <keyword id="9485939" type="LOCATION" weightage="20" keywordseo="covaxin">Covaxin</keyword>, are being used in the ongoing program. So, soon our vaccine basket would be studded with at least four different Covid-19 vaccines. Will these vaccines be effective against the ongoing surge? Will Sputnik-V prove to be a better choice than Covishield and Covaxin? Or will the single-dose JNJ Adv26 prove to be the game-changer? To answer these queries, we need first to unveil the variant virus behind the current surge. Which variant is driving the current wave? The virus is evolving rapidly now, and the new variants have shown more transmissibility than the earlier circulating strain (D614G). In March 2021, genome sequencing of virus samples led <a href="https://www.bbc.com/news/world-asia-india-56507988">by Consortium on Genomics (INSACOG) released data</a> from 18 Indian states of 10, 787 samples found 771 cases of known variants - 736 of the UK (B.1.1.7), 34 of the South African (B.1.351) and one Brazilian (P.1). While Punjab had 336 samples positive for the UK variant, a new variant of concern (VOC) having double mutations (E484Q and L452R) in the RBD of spike protein was found in 206 samples from Maharashtra. The more <a href="https://www.hindustantimes.com/india-news/double-mutant-now-most-common-of-variantsdata-101618512310963.html">recent report</a> suggests that this “double mutation” variant, which is now termed as B.1.617, was the most common in the samples sequenced in the 60 days before April 2 at 24%, whereas the second-most commonly found variant was the UK variant, B.1.1.7, at 13% of the samples. On April 1, B.1.617 accounted for 80% of all analysed genome sequences of mutant variants sent by India to the global repository GISAID. The Indian variant B.1.617 has changed the game The above analysis shows that the main offender is B.1.617, circulating menacingly in major states of India. The new Indian variant, B.1.617, is spreading fast outside the country and is now present in at least 11 countries and 8 US states. Let us analyse this new Indian variant in detail. It has got two-point mutations - E484Q and L452R. Both point substitutions fall in the key ‘receptor binding motif’ (RBM) (438-506) region of the ‘receptor binding domain’ (RBD). Hence, they may create major changes in the viral properties. Mutations at 484 residue is a known vaccine immunity evader mutation, and the <a href="https://www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1101/2021.03.31.437925v1.full.pdf">recent study</a> on the California lineage (B.1.427/B.1.429) has found L452R also has strong immunity-evading potential. <a href="https://www.cnbc.com/2021/04/08/researchers-identify-five-new-cases-of-double-mutant-covid-variant-in-california-.html">Most experts</a> are now convinced that this Indian variant, B.1.617, is far more contagious than earlier strains and may be resistant to existing vaccines. The more worrying aspect is that the L452R, some studies show, could even make the coronavirus resistant to T cells. The other circulating variant, the UK B.1.1.7, is known for 70% higher transmissibility and 60% more lethality than its predecessor strain, but a minimal immune evasion. <div type="image" title="India vaccination" msid="82128405" hostid="261" caption="&amp;lt;p&amp;gt;India vaccination&amp;lt;/p&amp;gt;"></div> Are the current Covid vaccines capable of taking on the Indian variant, B.1.617? As stated above, India has been employing Covishield and Covaxin in a large-scale mass inoculation drive since January 16 this year. Will these vaccines be efficacious against the new variant? What about their effectiveness against the other key variant, UK’s B.1.1.7? Usually, the UK B.1.1.7 variant is not considered an immune escape lineage. Most new vaccines tried against this variant (<keyword id="323030" type="COMPANY" weightage="20" keywordseo="Novavax">Novavax</keyword> in efficacy trial, Pfizer-BNT and <keyword id="4912868" type="LOCATION" weightage="20" keywordseo="moderna">Moderna</keyword> vaccines in laboratory studies) have only modest reductions in efficacy or neutralization titers. However, the recently published study on this vaccine in <a href="https://thelancet.com/action/showPdf?pii=S0140-6736%2821%2900628-0">The Lancet</a> demonstrates that Covishield retains a meaningful degree of efficacy against the UK variant but has almost 9-folds reductions in neutralization titers against this variant and &gt;10 points reduction in the point estimate of efficacy than against other lineages (70·4% Vs 81·5%). Worryingly, it fails to offer any reasonable protection against <a href="https://www.nejm.org/doi/full/10.1056/NEJMoa2102214">the South Africa variant, B.1.351</a>, whereas two other vaccines, Novavax and JNJ, had reasonable protection. This needs to be remembered that the South Africa variant contains E484K point mutation (substitution), which is also found in the new Indian variant, B.1.617. Since the 484 residue is strongly associated with immune evasion, the chances of Covishield providing any significant efficacy against the symptomatic illness against the new variant is quite remote. However, it can retain reasonable protection against severe disease and death owing to good T-cell immunity. Will Covaxin be a better option? There is no efficacy data available for this vaccine against the two different variants. One small <a href="https://biorxiv.org/content/10.1101/2021.01.26.426986v2">laboratory study</a> was conducted against the UK variant B.1.1.7 isolate in January this year, and the vaccine was found to have negligible reductions in neutralization against the variant. However, there is no data on its efficacy against E484 containing variants, the key mutation in B.1.617. Will Sputnik-V be equal to the task? In <a href="https://www.thelancet.com/journals/lancet/article/PIIS0140-6736(21)00234-8/fulltext">its phase III trial</a>, the Sputnik-V has reported a higher efficacy than Covishield, JNJ Adv26 and CanSino’s vaccines. However, the JNJ vaccine was tried in the latter half of the pandemic in the countries where new variants were surging. Nevertheless, the <a href="https://www.medrxiv.org/content/10.1101/2021.03.31.21254660v1.full.pdf">recent reports</a> have found limited efficacy of this vaccine against SA variant, B1351 containing mutation E484K which is also there in new Indian variant. In the lab study, 8 out of 12 (75%) of serum samples from 12 recipients of the Sputnik-V vaccine failed to neutralize the virus-containing same mutations as in South Africa’s B.1.351 with E484K. The same set of sera efficiently neutralized virus-containing B.1.1.7. There are other drawbacks also like the need for storage at low temperature though recently the manufacturers have claimed that it can be stored at 2-80 temperature and <a href="https://science.thewire.in/health/covishield-what-we-need-to-know-to-understand-the-safety-of-viral-vector-vaccines/">potentially serious rare side-effects</a> associated with other viral vector vaccines. The safety data of the vaccine are not yet fully revealed. Few experts are still sceptical about their claim of 91.6% efficacy and find their data fudgy. What about other Covid-19 vaccines? Two other vaccines, JNJ’s vector-based and Novavax’s protein subunit vaccine, are also in the pipeline for introduction in India. Both are being manufactured here also. Both these vaccines have shown reasonable protection against SA variant having E484K mutation, a key immune evader and related to the Indian B.1.617 variant in an efficacy trial in SA (Efficacy: JNJ=57-64 % and Novavax=49-60 %) (Table 1). The other advantage of JNJ is a single-dose administration. Novavax is extremely safe, being free from the rare adverse events of vector vaccines. Though they are not yet tried against the new Indian variant, going by their efficacy against E484K mutation, they are supposed to provide better protection against this variant than both Covishield and Sputnik-V. Table I. Efficacy of different Covid vaccines against key variants <img src="https://lh4.googleusercontent.com/MC1GTZJ-fgiopxfMUYiQulhHzDNNHfnSsKis4tucUGS0DJkJNGoV48Zi8bOdxuAB1j6kGkmq8hrPyPr5AxC-qC9R_1OnYJbp685bJ9KuRT58O8HV8Td7y8dF_iii59Gz1Np2MAu-y3i6EYOaJQ" /> Source: Dr Vipin Vashishtha What is needed? We are in a race against time to get global transmission rates low enough to prevent the emergence and spread of new variants. Put simply, the game has changed, and a successful global rollout of current vaccines by itself is no longer a guarantee of victory. Still, large scale vaccination may count provided we use them judiciously. First, we need to do extensive genomic sequencing of the circulating variant to ascertain the exact proportional burden of two major variants, B.1.617 and B.1.1.7. If the B.1.617 causes the major chunk of cases, our choice of vaccines shall change as stated above. Next, there is an urgent need to study the protective efficacy of the employed Covid vaccines in different categories of Covid positive individuals who had already received these vaccines. Small field studies of these vaccines against the two key variants can also be conducted. Even if these studies are not feasible, laboratory-based neutralization studies with live or pseudo-viruses having ‘double mutants’ can be attempted. There is a definite need for a booster dose of most Covid vaccines. <keyword id="44612" type="DOMAIN" weightage="20" keywordseo="Pfizer">Pfizer</keyword>, Moderna, and JNJ are already contemplating the 3rd dose within one year of the primary course. Other vaccine developers of Covishield, Sputnik and Novavax should also follow suit, particularly against new variants, B.1.351 and B.1.617. We need to be judicious while planning vaccination drives. It should have a significant impact at the population level and should counter any future surge. I would personally bet on Novavax. This highly efficacious vaccine has already shown better efficacy against 484 containing variants, free from the rare serious adverse events of viral vector vaccines and based on a time-tested platform. Fortunately, this vaccine is being produced in India, and the company has already committed at least one billion doses to India. Ideally, the public health policies should be guided by the science and the evidence, not by the programmatic feasibility. There is no point inoculating billion people with a jab that may not accord requisite protection against the offender. SEE ALSO: <a href="https://www.businessinsider.in/science/space/news/new-super-earth-only-takes-2-4-days-to-complete-a-year/articleshow/82115255.cms">A newly found ‘super’ Earth only takes 2.4 days to complete a year</a> <a href="https://www.businessinsider.in/science/space/news/watch-crystal-clear-hd-video-of-nasa-astronauts-walking-in-space/articleshow/82099944.cms">WATCH: Crystal clear footage of NASA astronauts walking in space, changing out pipes, installing cameras and much more</a> <a href="https://www.businessinsider.in/science/space/news/scientists-are-roasting-meteorites-to-recreate-the-birth-of-planets/articleshow/82102499.cms">How to bake a meteorite — scientists are heating up space rocks to recreate the birth of planets</a>

You Searched For "CanSino" and got 8 results

The first human data from AstraZeneca and Oxford's coronavirus vaccine shows an immune response, a positive sign the shot might work

Andrew Dunn

Six Indian companies working on vaccine for COVID-19

PTI

COVID-19 vaccine hunt heats up globally, still no guarantee

PTI

Russia has approved a coronavirus vaccine without widespread testing. Medical experts warn it could be dangerous.

Susie Neilson

Six Indian companies working on COVID-19 vaccine, many challenges in finding a preventive: experts

PTI

The upstart biotech Moderna is aiming to have its coronavirus vaccine ready for emergency use in the fall. Here's how they plan to execute in record time.

Andrew Dunn

OPINION: “I would bet on Novovax,” a doctor’s take on how to make the COVID-19 vaccine jabs more effective

Dr. Vipin M. Vashishtha

Why a coronavirus vaccine won't be ready for public distribution until 2021, according to a top virologist

Guido Vanham and Peter Vanham