(TibetanReview.net, May05’20) – There are 102 candidate vaccines in the race to find a cure for the Covid-19 pandemic disease, with eight of the leading vaccines being in human testing phase, reported the timesofindia.com May 4, citing World Health Organization (WHO).
While hopes remain high that a cure will be ready as early as Sep 2020 or in a year and half, it is also possible that the world will never see a Covid-19 vaccine, Dr David Nabarro, WHO’s Covid-19 special envoy, was quoted as saying in a CNN report.
“There are some viruses that we still do not have vaccines against. We can’t make an absolute assumption that a vaccine will appear at all, or if it does appear, whether it will pass all the tests of efficacy and safety,” Dr Nabarro was quoted as saying.
For example, nearly four decades and 32 million deaths later, the world is still waiting for an HIV vaccine. Likewise, an effective vaccine for dengue fever, which infects as many as 400,000 people a year, has eluded scientists for decades.
However, optimism remains high for a vaccine for Covid-19 with companies going for mass production of vials even as tests are still underway.
