Vaccines are complicated!
Thank you to the virologists, lab technicians, and support teams currently developing a vaccine. A recent article in Nature offers a nice visual and tutorial on vaccines. Here is the condensed version.
Roughly 90 SARS-CoV-2 (novel coronavirus) vaccines are being developed and tested. Each one works to prevent the virus from causing illness while still activating the body’s immune system to fight the virus and remember the fight for future encounters.
There are several ways to introduce a virus to the body without causing illness to create an immune response.
Virus vaccines use incapacitated viruses to trick the body into developing an immune response without first causing the illness.
Viral-vector vaccines insert the protein of one virus (SARS-CoV-2 in this case) within the shell of another virus (called the vector). This allows the virus to replicate inside the body to produce an immune response, but not illness.
Nucleic-acid vaccines use the recipes for Coronavirus proteins, RNA and DNA, to create an immune response without use of a whole virus.
Protein-based vaccines use virus protein units, not the recipe, to create an immune response.
Once one of the above (and a few other) processes shows promise, the vaccine undergoes safety testing in animals and people. Once deemed safe, large trials are conducted to determine if the vaccine is successful in preventing infection. Even with teams working around the clock, a safe, effective vaccine is not likely for 18-24 months.
