{"id":106299,"date":"2020-09-06T14:45:52","date_gmt":"2020-09-06T21:45:52","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/?p=106299"},"modified":"2020-09-06T14:45:52","modified_gmt":"2020-09-06T21:45:52","slug":"covid-19-who-tempers-quick-vaccine-hopes","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/2020\/09\/06\/covid-19-who-tempers-quick-vaccine-hopes\/","title":{"rendered":"COVID-19: WHO tempers quick vaccine hopes"},"content":{"rendered":"<h2><span style=\"color: #0000ff;\"><em>Courtesy Adaderana<\/em><\/span><\/h2>\n\n\n<p>The World Health Organization says that it did not expect widespread immunisation against the novel coronavirus until mid-2021, tempering hopes just as research revealed encouraging early results from a Russian vaccine.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>The virus which has killed nearly 870,000 people worldwide continues to spread, with Italy\u2019s flamboyant former prime minister Silvio Berlusconi now in hospital after becoming the latest high-profile figure to test positive for Covid-19.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Across the world, governments are hoping to announce a vaccine as soon as possible against the virus, which has infected well over 26 million people, upended millions of lives and wreaked havoc on the global economy.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>The UN health agency welcomed the fact that a considerable number\u201d of vaccine candidates had entered final stage trials, which typically involve tens of thousands of people.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>But in terms of realistic timelines, we are really not expecting to see widespread vaccination until the middle of next year,\u201d WHO spokeswoman Margaret Harris said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>And WHO chief Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus said the agency would not endorse a vaccine if it is not effective and safe.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>\u2018Trials too small\u2019<br>Russia has already approved a vaccine, and research published in The Lancet medical journal on Friday said patients involved in early tests developed antibodies with no serious adverse events\u201d.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>But scientists cautioned the trials were too small &#8212; just 76 participants &#8212; to prove safety and effectiveness.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Washington has also urged US states to get ready for a potential vaccine rollout by November 1, sparking concerns President Donald Trump\u2019s administration is rushing to begin distributing a vaccine before the November 3 election.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Under normal procedures, test administrators must wait for months or years to verify that vaccine candidates are safe and efficacious.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>But there has been massive pressure to roll out a vaccine quickly as the pandemic continues to take its toll.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>-Agencies<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Courtesy Adaderana The World Health Organization says that it did not expect widespread immunisation against the novel coronavirus until mid-2021, tempering hopes just as research revealed encouraging early results from a Russian vaccine. The virus which has killed nearly 870,000 people worldwide continues to spread, with Italy\u2019s flamboyant former prime minister Silvio Berlusconi now in [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":true,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[122],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-106299","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-health"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/106299","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=106299"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/106299\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=106299"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=106299"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=106299"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}