Virus vaccine could be ready by autumn: Oxford scientist

As human trials have commenced after recruiting 510 volunteers, the coronavirus vaccine could be ready as early as autumn, an Oxford University scientist who is part of the team that is working on developing a vaccine has said.
Since the coronavirus pandemic hit the world, everybody has had the same question in mind: When will humanity acquire a vaccine for the coronavirus, the ultimate way to fully control the pandemic?

We all know that it takes time for a vaccine to get developed, as the vaccines are for healthy people and, thus, the hardest phase is the trial on humans.
Dr. Tonia Thomas from the U.K.'s University of Oxford, who is the Vaccine Knowledge project manager of the Oxford Vaccine Group, has said in an email that new technologies were shortening the period of vaccine development.

Vaccine to be manufactured while trials continue
"The availability of the genetic sequence made it possible to start working on a vaccine very early [in January]. Experts have estimated that it will take 12-18 months to develop a new vaccine at high speed. Under normal circumstances, most vaccine development programs take more than five years, so this is still a considerably accelerated timescale. This 12-18-month prediction includes the time taken to develop manufacturing processes to produce the vaccine on a larger scale, as well as preclinical testing in animals and evaluation of the vaccine in human participants in a clinical trial. Scientists need to assess the safety and efficacy of the vaccine over a number of weeks and months through phase I, II and III clinical trials. If the vaccine is safe and efficacious, regulatory approval is needed before the vaccine can be deployed," she said.
But, according to Dr. Thomas, many of...