4 ms·

Indeed, that would be fast, but maybe the virus is in a category we have already seen and created vaccines for before. There seems to be already about 6 large

Indeed, that would be fast, but maybe the virus is in a category we have already seen and created vaccines for before. There seems to be already about 6 large scale tests in progress in the world (ie. after lab/animal/small group), that's a good sign. Anyway, I don't see much reason for Dr. Fauci to make such kind of statement if it was still really years away. The tests will tell where we are, we'll see in a month or two.

WorldMaker 6y ago
> Indeed, that would be fast, but maybe the virus is in a category we have already seen and created vaccines for before. I pointed this out two comments up, but the coronavirus family is common enough that something like 1/3 of the causes of the Common Cold is a coronavirus (the rest IIRC are a different family known as rhinoviruses). We've never managed a Common Cold vaccine or vaccines despite something like a century of work (at least as long as we've been fighting annual flu season with flu vaccines). In the immediate past couple of decades we've seen an increasing number of deadly coronaviruses: the first SARS virus (this being the second), the MERS virus, basically several of the things in the last few years people have been referring to by possibly misnomers like "avian flu" and "swine flu" have been in this family and so forth. So far we've not been successful in creating a vaccine for any of those. No coronavirus in human history has a vaccine, and there is a lot of history with the family (contrary to whatever racist and/or "animal jumping" theories people have that this is something very radically new; it's a "very uncommon cold"). On the hopeful side, Science often builds strongly on failure, and so it could be that we are perfectly set up for a breakthrough from all of this history of vaccine failure. (And again, I pointed out two comments above the hopeful optimism that a coronavirus vaccine puts us on a wonderful path to possible a common cold vaccine. That could be amazing for future humanity.) Just that history so far with this entire family/category of viruses doesn't give us a lot of room for hope right now.

WorldMaker 6y ago

> Indeed, that would be fast, but maybe the virus is in a category we have already seen and created vaccines for before. I pointed this out two comments up, but the coronavirus family is common enough that something like 1/3 of the causes of the Common Cold is a coronavirus (the rest IIRC are a different family known as rhinoviruses). We've never managed a Common Cold vaccine or vaccines despite something like a century of work (at least as long as we've been fighting annual flu season with flu vaccines). In the immediate past couple of decades we've seen an increasing number of deadly coronaviruses: the first SARS virus (this being the second), the MERS virus, basically several of the things in the last few years people have been referring to by possibly misnomers like "avian flu" and "swine flu" have been in this family and so forth. So far we've not been successful in creating a vaccine for any of those. No coronavirus in human history has a vaccine, and there is a lot of history with the family (contrary to whatever racist and/or "animal jumping" theories people have that this is something very radically new; it's a "very uncommon cold"). On the hopeful side, Science often builds strongly on failure, and so it could be that we are perfectly set up for a breakthrough from all of this history of vaccine failure. (And again, I pointed out two comments above the hopeful optimism that a coronavirus vaccine puts us on a wonderful path to possible a common cold vaccine. That could be amazing for future humanity.) Just that history so far with this entire family/category of viruses doesn't give us a lot of room for hope right now.