Novel coronavirus vaccine: An international holy grail

Abstract

Coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic is raging in the world with no definitive cure or vaccine at hand. As of July 17, 2020, there have been 13,937,253 cases and 591,957 deaths globally. Hence the rush to find a cure, or a vaccine, or both. We proceed to outline some of the scientific challenges that lie in the path of the successful development of the COVID-19 vaccine. Coronaviruses do not induce long-lasting immunity; enhancing the vaccine candidate's immunogenicity is an essential imperative for the COVID-19 vaccine. On the one hand developing a COVID-19 vaccine should be relatively easy as compared to the vaccine development for HIV and hepatitis C, primarily because of the slower mutation rate of severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2). On the other hand, there are different types of challenges, such as identifying optimum immunogenic antigen, safety issues encountered with vaccine development programs for SARS and MERS, identification of suitable adjuvants, and getting the vaccine as soon as possible. Globally, more than 150 projects are working toward the development of the SARS-CoV-2 vaccine; however, only 25 are approved for clinical trials. While existing knowledge of conventional vaccine technologies and next-generation technologies for innovative vaccine platforms has hastened vaccine development, however, the time and finances have both been constrained. Fast-tracking of research, human challenge studies, and inclusion of specific animal models such as ACE2A are some suggested strategies to hasten the process. In addition, there is a need for generous funding, collaborative effort, and comprehensive data sharing to get the world the COVID vaccine sooner.

Keywords

• clinical trials
• coronavirus disease 2019
• mrna-1273 vaccine
• pandemics
• severe acute respiratory syndrome virus
• vaccine