SARS (severe acute respiratory syndrome) and MERS (Middle East respiratory syndrome) to try to stop this new pathogen, Krammer said.
“There are SARS vaccines and MERS vaccines that work. We can model a vaccine right away with the new coronavirus, based on those vaccines. My lab is doing that. There’s probably 50 labs in the U.S. that are doing that right now,” Krammer said.
For example, virologist Keith Chappell at the University of Queensland in Australia told NPR that his lab is working at speed to produce a vaccine using the virus’ genetic sequence, which Chinese researchers cracked and have shared with the world.
“Our goal was to be able to hit 16 weeks from sequence information to having a product that is shown to be safe and effective, and is ready for administration to the first humans,” Chappell said.
The more high-profile efforts at developing a coronavirus vaccine include:
A Massachusetts biotech company called Moderna is developing a vaccine genetically designed by