Health officials say we will actually get back to “normal” someday, and that science will save us.
The pandemic has been dragging on for months now. In some ways, there seems to be no end in sight. While Canada is getting its cases of COVID-19 under control, at least for the moment, the US is having trouble containing the fire. With borders technically closed but flights returning to the skies, (and many without social distancing), it is sometimes hard to believe we will ever get ahead of the coronavirus in the race to wellness.
Health experts are reassuring us that someday, we will actually get back to normal. Things may not feel exactly as they did before however, but we won’t be staying many feet and meters apart. We will not be wearing masks. Riding the subway and visiting the local mall will not constantly cause us to think twice about our very existence.
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How will it happen? As Dr. Fauci, love him or hate him, says the coronavirus pandemic will end through public health measures and science. These two will ultimately come to our rescue. The development of therapeutics and a vaccine really will save us.
Here’s what we know about COVID-19 vaccine development in the US. According to Fauci, one of the coronavirus vaccines being developed will be going into advanced phase three trials by the end of July. Other vaccine candidates will also enter advanced trials late this summer and in early fall, which is amazing news. While no one can say if these efforts will succeed in delivering a COVID-19 vaccine that works, Fauci says he is optimistic.
There are three phases in clinical trials to bring a vaccine to market. In the first phase, the vaccine is tested in several small groups of people. Next, it is tested on people who are of similar age and of similar physical health to those who will ultimately receive the vaccine. Since the coronavirus vaccine will presumably be given out widely like a flu vaccine, this could be a complicated step. The third and final phase of testing involves giving the drug to thousands of people. This is for safety, to see what the possible side effects may be.
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Researchers are leaving no stone unturned in the quest to find a virus that works. In Canada, Medicago, a biotechnology company based in Quebec City, is actually using the leaves of tobacco plants to create a coronavirus vaccine. Researchers are using the plant’s leaves to produce the S-spike protein of the novel coronavirus. They are using virus-like particles to imitate the shape and size of SARS-Co-V-2, the virus that causes COVID-19. The human body then recognizes this viral fingerprint and creates an immune response to it, all without using animal products or any live viruses to create the final vaccine.
Medicago is collaborating with Dr. Gary Kobinger, an infectious disease expert from Laval University who worked at developing the vaccine to treat Ebola.
And researchers in many other countries are also hard at work, trying to help us. The good news is that at the end of all of this, the world will very likely have a vaccine that works in some capacity to prevent COVID-19. We will also have a great library of coronavirus vaccine research and development to build on. The world will inevitably face other coronavirus outbreaks in the future, and we will be a few steps ahead when that happens, thank goodness.
photo credits: Paul Craft/Shutterstock.com
