First human trials of Coronavirus vaccine to begin within days

The first human trials of a coronavirus vaccine are to be launched within days, scientists in the US have said.

The 'genetic hack' was accelerated past the animal testing stage and will be used on healthy volunteers, then patients if it deemed safe, reports Daily Mail Online.

It comes as scientists in Britain said a vaccine could be tested on humans by June after encouraging results on mice.

Massachusetts-based Moderna created the candidate cure but have taken a different route to traditional techniques.

Normally a weaker bug is planted in the body so a patient can adapt to fight off the infection.

But the new method sees messenger RNA stimulates the immune system to make similar proteins to the killer virus, which it can then combat.

The vaccine prototype is being funded by the Coalition for Epidemic Preparedness Innovations, with the foundation's Dr Melanie Saville telling the Telegraph: 'Contain and delay is the approach taken in the UK and a number of different countries.

'The approaches are really to buy time in the context of the stretch it puts on the healthcare system - it also buys time for vaccines to be developed.

'We don't know how the pandemic will evolve, whether, for example, it comes in various different waves.'

The coronavirus, which causes a disease called COVID-19 - and has killed nearly 5,000 people globally - cannot currently be cured or prevented.

American researches spearheading the fight against the deadly bug admit hopes of millions of vaccines within a year are 'aspirational'.

And in a further blow for Britain, any cure would not be able to halt the anticipated peak in cases in May.

But UK researchers, led by Mucosal Infection and Immunity head Dr Robin Shattock, said they have successfully trialled a vaccine in mice and are hopeful it could be ready for human trials by June.

Senior researcher Dr Paul McKay, of Imperial College London, told the Express: 'I've got results from a month after I injected (the mice) and the vaccine works really, really well.'

The team is working with scientists in Paris to determine the vaccine's effectiveness in monkeys.

Dr McKay said they have applied for further funding from the Medical Research Council to conduct human clinical trials.

'If we get the funding for the human clinical trials, we will put it into people by June,' he said.

'If British scientists here develop a vaccine it would be great if the Government supported it.'

Should the human trials be successful, the team is hopeful the vaccine will be available for patients in a year.

People who catch the illness have to be isolated and wait for their body to fight it off, with medical help if they need it for symptoms or more serious infection.

A working vaccine could stop the bug in its tracks and some experts think it could become a recurring fixture in human society in the same way colds and flu are.

Some scientists and medical experts are concerned rushing a vaccine could end up worsening the infection in some patients rather than preventing it.

Studies have suggested that coronavirus vaccines carry the risk of what is known as vaccine enhancement, where instead of protecting against infection, the vaccine can actually make the disease worse when a vaccinated person is infected with the virus.

The mechanism that causes the risk is not fully understood and is one of the stumbling blocks that has prevented the successful development of a coronavirus vaccine.

Normally, researchers would take months to test for the possibility of vaccine enhancement in animals.

Given the urgency to stem the spread of the new coronavirus, some drugmakers are moving straight into small-scale human tests, without waiting for the completion of such animal tests.

Dr Peter Hotez, dean of the National School of Tropical Medicine at Baylor College of Medicine, said: 'I understand the importance of accelerating timelines for vaccines in general, but from everything I know, this is not the vaccine to be doing it with.' 

Hotez worked on development of a vaccine for SARS (Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome), the coronavirus behind a major 2003 outbreak, and found some vaccinated animals developed more severe disease compared with unvaccinated animals when they were exposed to the virus.

He said: 'There is a risk of immune enhancement. The way you reduce that risk is first you show it does not occur in laboratory animals.'

Hotez testified last week before the US House Committee on Science, Space and Technology about the need for sustained funding for vaccine research.

There remains no vaccine for any of the new coronaviruses that have caused outbreaks in the past 20 years.