World to get COVID-19 vaccine by 2020 end or early 2021, claims US pharma cos

These representatives met this week members of the Energy and Commerce Committee.

The members heard directly from representatives of five companies developing a COVID-19 vaccine at an Oversight and Investigations Subcommittee hearing entitled, “Pathway to a Vaccine: Efforts to Develop a Safe, Effective and Accessible COVID-19 Vaccine.”

The hearing examined the current state of research, development, and manufacturing of potential vaccines for COVID-19, according to information provided by Congresswoman Susan W Brooks.

Representatives from the companies provided a promising update on when a vaccine may be available. The development efforts for a COVID-19 vaccine are truly unprecedented and represent the exemplary work of pharmaceutical companies around the globe.

“Every witness expressed their intent to develop a safe and effective vaccine to combat this virus. Each company is on track to set a record-breaking pace for developing a vaccine by either the end of 2020 or beginning of 2021,” Susan W Brooks said.

Each witness in the hearing expressed that the American public should take great confidence in the FDA’s guidance. The FDA’s safety and effectiveness standards are the result of years of rigorous research into infectious diseases and represent the gold standard world-wide.

Right now, the companies are scaling up manufacturing “at risk”, by laying the groundwork to produce millions of doses of vaccines before they have proven the safety and effectiveness of the vaccine. If the vaccine is not proven to work, then the candidate won’t be brought to market. If, however, the vaccine candidate is successful they will have millions of doses ready to be distributed immediately upon approval.