Thanks to Oxford’s partnership with the bio-pharmaceutical company, AstraZeneca, the results of a two phase trial mentioned back in early May have been demonstrating excellent signs of progress.
What We Know:
- According to a medical journal published by The Lancet on Monday, the vaccine, being dubbed “AZD1222” has reported that results of the first clinical study proved the vaccine to be safe and tolerated. British health officials called Oxford University team’s potential coronavirus vaccine “extremely encouraging”. Both phases of the study of more than 1,000 patients reported that the test vaccine triggered two immune responses, antibodies and a T-cell response.
- A news release from the Jenner Institute at Oxford stated that T-cell response happened within 14 days. This means the body effectively created white blood cells that defeated the infected cell. The second response, which happened within 28 days, saw the development of antibodies, the body’s natural defense against illnesses.
- Deputy Director of the International Vaccine Access Center at Johns Hopkins University, Naor Bar-Zeev, stated that so far “everything we’ve seen has been encouraging”. Bar-zeev is not directly involved with the studies but has found that there haven’t been negative effects yet.
- Of the patients that received the test vaccine, the only common side effects included muscle ache, chills, and feeling feverish. Fortunately, researchers advised that the drug acetaminophen relieved those symptoms.
- The World Health Organization (WHO) states that there are about 24 coronavirus vaccine candidates in the world running trials, but despite that, only two have proven to be potential winners. The two candidates are Oxford-AstraZeneca and one vaccine from Sinovac Biotech. So far, they are the only ones to reach phase three trials.
The third phase of this process is usually the largest of the three trials before they can be officially approved. Within this phase, it is finally determined whether the vaccine will be more or less effective than regular care, and longer term effects will be monitored.
