The Trump administration is reportedly organizing a Manhattan Project-style effort to expedite the development of a coronavirus vaccine
Experts say the predicted development timeline for an approved COVID-19 vaccine is already remarkably quick at an estimated 12 to 18 months. But the Trump administration is aiming to get one out even faster, much like Oxford University, Bloomberg reports.
Two people familiar with the matter told Bloomberg the administration is orchestrating a Manhattan Project-style operation that aims to have 100 million doses of a coronavirus vaccine out by the end of the year. It will take a united effort by private pharmaceutical companies, government agencies, and the military to get there.
The expedited timeframe will also likely be wasteful, Bloomberg notes. It will cost billions of dollars and require mass production of vaccine candidates that may fail (rendering them useless), so the ones that don't are ready to be distributed widely upon approval.
The project will reportedly be funded by money the government already has and won't require congressional approval. Those resources will first be used to test experimental vaccines in animals before launching coordinated human clinical trials to further narrow the field. There are numerous candidates in development already, but the efforts haven't been cohesive. Read more at Bloomberg.
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