Oxford COVID-19 Vaccine's Human Trial Results Will Arrive By June, Researcher Confirms

With every passing day, we are getting closer to containing and probably curing COVID-19.

A few weeks ago we saw the team at Oxford University, that was developing its vaccine under the guidance of Sarah Gilbert, underwent human trials.

Reuters

Last week, the researchers revealed that another study involving monkeys didn¡¯t contract COVID-19 after being injected with the vaccine, which shows more promise in the vaccine.

And now, Sir John Bell, Regius Professor of Medicine at Oxford University, in a conversation with NBC News revealed that researchers could get an idea for the effectiveness of the vaccine for human use by sometime in June.

Oxford vaccine against COVID-19

In a conversation during NBC¡¯s ¡®Meet the Press¡¯, Bell stated that researchers could collect enough data from the phase two trials to get a concrete basis for the efficacy of the vaccine next month.

Bell also stated that the chances of success in developing a vaccine looks ¡®pretty good¡¯ in his words. He stated, ¡°we are gradually reeling it in, bit by bit and as every day goes by, the likelihood of success goes up. If the disease peters out in the U.K., we have sites already in play in other parts of the world where it¡¯s active.¡±

He emphasised the fact how COVID-19 differs from the normal flu. He said, ¡°Coronavirus doesn¡¯t mutate at the pace of flu as far as we can see but it¡¯s also quite a tricky virus in terms of dictating long-term immune responses to it and as a result I suspect we may need to have relatively regular vaccinations against coronavirus going into the future. That, of course, remains to be seen but that¡¯s my bet at the moment, is that this is likely to be a seasonal coronavirus vaccine.¡±

Sir John Bell

He also revealed the fact that the team at Oxford is making sure that safety is of prime concern while fast-tracking the potential vaccine while being very careful.

He concluded, stating, ¡°I think we¡¯ve got reason to believe that the efficacy of the vaccine in terms of generating strong antibody responses is probably going to be OK. The real question is whether the safety profile¡¯s going to be fine. So that¡¯s actually the main focus of the clinical studies.¡±

According to lead researcher Professor Sarah Gilbert, their 'ChAdOx1' vaccine can work against the coronavirus called SARS-CoV-2. Professor Gilbert has mentioned in the past that said she was 80 per cent confident of the vaccine's success, stating, ¡°Personally, I have a high degree of confidence. This is my view, because I've worked with this technology a lot, and I've worked on the MERS vaccine trials, and I've seen what that can do.¡±

The Oxford vaccine 'ChAdOx1' has ICMR's backing, and in fact Serum India has announced that they will be manufacturing the vaccine to take down COVID-19, based on the human trials currently being tested by Oxford University in the UK, and will begin their own trials from May onwards.