“COVID-19 vaccine protects monkeys from new coronavirus, Chinese biotech reports”

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Article link: https://www.sciencemag.org/news/2020/04/covid-19-vaccine-protects-monkeys-new-coronavirus-chinese-biotech-reports

Author: Jon Cohen
Published on April 23, 2020 in Science Magazine

“2BEHRJJ (200414) — BEIJING, April 14, 2020 (Xinhua) — A staff member displays samples of the COVID-19 inactivated vaccine at Sinovac Biotech Ltd., in Beijing, capital of China, March 16, 2020. China has approved two COVID-19 inactivated vaccine candidates for clinical trials, according to the State Council joint prevention and control mechanism against the coronavirus Tuesday. The two vaccine candidates are developed by Wuhan Institute of Biological Products under the China National Pharmaceutical Group (Sinopharm) and Sinovac Research and Development Co., Ltd, a company based in Beijing. Clinical”

Amidst the race to discover a COVID-19 vaccine, Cohen reports that the private Chinese company, Sinovac Biotech, has developed a promising candidate. The company’s vaccine is not only the first to prevent COVID-19 in monkeys but also shows dose-dependent effects. In other words, the higher the vaccine dose, the lower the chances of becoming sick. The Chinese government has approved the vaccine for human clinical trials, which are the most critical phase of drug testing; not only is it important to demonstrate that the vaccine also works for human cells, there may be unknown (and potentially lethal) side effects associated with human use. Nevertheless, this is still an exciting finding, and hopefully clinical trials have promising results as well.

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