The COVID Vaccine Is Almost Here — And We Have Monkeys to Thank
by Michael Majchrowicz, Miami New Times, December 11, 2020
Two pharmaceutical companies have requested emergency authorization for what scientists are hailing as highly effective COVID-19 vaccines — and we almost certainly have monkeys to thank for that.
Last night, the Food and Drug Administration’s (FDA) COVID vaccine panel recommended that the agency authorize the Pfizer vaccine to be distributed in the U.S., which could begin as early as next week.
Monkeys and other nonhuman test subjects have been an extremely valuable research component in helping the medical community better understand COVID, which has so far killed 290,000 people in the U.S. and more than 19,000 in Florida. In two peer-reviewed studies published this spring in Science magazine, researchers who infected groups of rhesus macaque monkeys with the coronavirus found that primates were capable of developing protective immunity against the disease. That development helped pave the way for the vaccines that could start to put an end to the pandemic. Continue reading…
Today the @pfizer @BioNTech_Group Covid-19 vaccine was approved for emergency in the UK 🥳
— Understanding Animal Research (@animalresearch) December 2, 2020
In 10 months vaccine scientists have achieved what would usually take 10 years, all while following the usual regulatory procedures#CovidVaccine #AnimalResearch https://t.co/IcoShgCnbC pic.twitter.com/MJQLh9hV3E