The Race for Diversity in COVID-19 Vaccine Trials

In the frantic race for a COVID-19 vaccine, a longstanding issue in clinical trials persists: the lack of diversity.The long history of abusive research practices has left many people of color distrustful of the medical establishment, making it difficult to recruit them for clinical trials.

As Black people are dying of COVID-19 at nearly 2.5X the rate of whites, recruiting a balanced cohort is essential. And that requires extra effort and expense such as community outreach, childcare, and transportation.

And what does sufficient diversity look like? There’s no consensus on that—but some scientists argue participants should reflect the burden of disease.

According to Washington Post, nucleic acid (DNA and RNA),viral-vectored ,sub unit ,weakened or inactivated virus  etc. are the different vaccine technologies being developed around the world. Although vaccine development usually takes years,the step by step procedures are now overlapping in the race to find a vaccine for a global disease that has killed hundreds of thousands of people.

Human testing began in some cases before animal studies were finished. As companies launch small Phase 1 trials intended to establish the correct dose, they already are planning the Phase 3 trials that evaluate whether the vaccines are effective and safe, the report said.

Courtesy: Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health