Daily US Times: Human trial of new vaccine begins in the UK as volunteers have begun being immunised with a new UK coronavirus vaccine.

Over the coming weeks, about 300 people will have the vaccine, as part of a trial led by Prof Robin Shattock and his colleagues, at Imperial College London.

Tests in animals suggest the vaccine triggers an effective immune response and is safe.

Experts at Oxford University have already started human trials.

There are around 120 vaccine programmes underway and the UK trial is one of them.

‘I volunteered to help beat the virus’

The 39-year-old Kathy is one of the first volunteers taking part in the Imperial trial. She works in France.

She volunteered because she wanted to play a part in fighting the virus, she said.

“I think it came from not really knowing what I could do to help, and this turned out to be something that I could do.”

She added: “And understanding that it’s not likely that things will get back to normal until there is a vaccine, so wanting to be part of that progress as well.”

After this first phase, another trial is being planned for October, which will involve 6,000 people.

The vaccine could be distributed in the UK and overseas from early 2021, the Imperial team hopes.

A new approach

The latest human trial is unique to the previous others. Many traditional vaccines are based on a modified or weakened form of virus, or parts of it, but the Imperial vaccine is based on a new approach. The team used synthetic strands of genetic code, called RNA, which mimic the virus.

Once injected into muscle, the RNA self-amplifies – generating copies of itself – and instructs the body’s own cells to make copies of a spike protein found on the outside of the virus.

The vaccine should train the immune system to recognise and fight coronavirus without having to develop Covid-19.

Prof Shattock said they have been able to produce a vaccine from scratch and take it to human trials in just a few months.

He said: “If our approach works and the vaccine provides effective protection against disease, it could revolutionise how we respond to disease outbreaks in future.”

Dr Katrina Pollock, Chief investigator for the study, added: “I wouldn’t be working on this trial if I didn’t feel cautiously optimistic that we will see a great immune response in our participants.”

“The pre-clinical data looked very promising. We’re getting a neutralising antibody response which is the immune response you would want to protect from infection. But there’s still a long way to go to evaluate this vaccine.”

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