Many organizations, including the National Institutes of Health, have begun work to develop a vaccine against a new strain of coronavirus known as 2019-nCoV.
Scientists are just getting started, but their vaccine development strategy will benefit from both the work that has been done on closely related viruses such as SARS and MERS, and the advances that have been made in nucleic acid-based vaccine technologies. These are DNA and RNA vaccines that produce the vaccine antigen in your own body.
Is work being done on this particular strain?
No, but work has continued for other closely related coronaviruses that have caused severe illness in humans, namely MERS and SARS.
Scientists were not worried about this particular strain, as they did not know that it existed and could cause disease in humans until it caused an outbreak.
How will scientists know when to work on a coronavirus vaccine?
Historically, work on vaccines against severe coronaviruses begins when viruses begin to infect humans.
Given that this is the third major outbreak of the novel coronavirus we have had in the past two decades, and the severity of the disease caused by these viruses, it is imperative to consider investing in developing a vaccine that will protect against them.
What does this work involve and when will people be able to get the vaccine?
This work includes the development of vaccine constructs – for example, the production of the correct target antigens, viral proteins that are affected by the immune system, followed by testing in animals to show that they are protective and safe.
Once safety and efficacy are established, vaccines can go into human clinical trials. If vaccines produce the expected immune response and protection and are considered safe, they can be mass-produced to vaccinate the population.
Scientists currently lack virus isolates – or samples of the virus – to test vaccines. There are also not enough antibodies to make sure the vaccine is working. We need a virus to test if the immune response caused by the vaccine is working.
It also needs to be established on which animals to test the vaccine. The list may include mice and primates.
The development of a vaccine will likely take months.
Can people ever be safe from such viral outbreaks?
Scientists expect outbreaks of epidemics to occur in the foreseeable future at irregular intervals.
To try to prevent major outbreaks and pandemics, there is a need to improve surveillance in both humans and animals around the world, as well as invest in risk assessments that will allow scientists to assess the potential threat to human health from detected viruses.
Global action is needed to invest in new vaccine approaches that can be quickly applied whenever a new virus such as the current coronavirus emerges, as well as viruses like Zika, Ebola, or the flu.
Currently, responses to emerging pathogens are mostly reactive, meaning they start after an outbreak. A more proactive approach, supported by ongoing funding, is needed.
Aubrey Gordon, Professor of Public Health, University of Michigan; and Florian Crammer, Professor of Vaccination, Icahn School of Medicine, Sinai.
This article was published by The Conversation.
