Few things About the PFIZER’S COVID-19 Vaccine

Since the outbreak of Novel Coronavirus-COVID-19, at the very start of this year, the world has been brought to a standstill. All the things that one had never thought would happen like complete closure of public transports, the unprecedented lockdown on various businesses, ban on traveling and many more, has happened!
During these unprecedented times, Vaccine is something that the world is desperately waiting for!

Since the outbreak already more than 1.26 MN people worldwide have lost their lives to this deadly virus! More than a hundred vaccines are in the trial phase but only three of them were allowed phase three trials and amongst them, PFIZER – US Based Drugmaker along with a partnership with a Germany-based firm has announced that they have developed a vaccine. This vaccine is more valuable than platinum, so to speak!

How Effective this Vaccine Really is?

According to the preliminary data from last-stage human trials of this vaccine, which Pfizer has developed with a Germany-based BioNTech firm, it’s been found that the vaccine is 90% effective! Generally, a vaccine is considered to be good even if that is 50-60 percent effective. So this vaccine which is 90% effective is a commendable job by the drugmaker!

What Type of Vaccine has Pfizer and BioNTech Developed?

This vaccine is developed using RNA technology. It makes use of messenger RNA molecules which tell the cells which protein to be built. The biggest advantage of this is – it is synthetically developed i.e. there is no need to inject the virus. Also, this type of vaccine can be easily manufactured on large scale in large vats known as bio-reactors.

What does the Early Result of this Vaccine say?

The vaccine’s first interim efficacy analysis signals that it is able to show effectiveness against the COVID-19!
According to findings,
This vaccine was 90% effective in preventing COVID-19 among the persons who had received a second dose as opposed to those who had only received a placebo.
There were around forty-thousand participants in the third-phase out of which around thirty-eight thousand were given a second dose and none of them showed any side effects! These are some outstanding results!

Does this mean that this vaccine will receive emergency approval in the United States?
Well, can’t say! They are collecting the safety data and estimate that it will take until the third week of November 2020 to gather and assess the comprehensive data from the final phase.

What could be the major roadblocks in scaling up the productions of this COVID-19 vaccine?
1.] Any vaccine needs to be stored at very low temperatures thus there can be some logistical issues for storage.

2.] Because of its required storage temperature distribution is quite difficult in hot temperature zones.

So to conclude this great news for each one of us! Let’s hope that everything goes as planned so that we could resume our day-to-day life as it was before the Virus!