Coronavirus vaccine may never come, health expert warns

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A special envoy to the World Health Organization on the coronavirus said in an interview Sunday that the global economy may have to assume that there will not be a vaccine and consider ways to approach the virus a “constant threat."

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Dr. David Nabarro, a professor of global health at Imperial College London, told CNN that societies need to get into the position where they can defend against it while getting on with daily lives. He pointed out that some viruses do not have a vaccine. The report pointed out that some vaccines are in the trial stage and some experts are optimistic due to the fact that COVID-19 is not known to mutate at a fast rate.

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“There are some viruses that we still do not have vaccines against,” he told CNN. “We can’t make an absolute assumption that a vaccine all appear at all, or if it does appear, whether it will pass all the tests of efficacy and safety.”

The Center for Infectious Disease Research at the University of Minnesota recently suggested that COVID-19 will linger for the next two years and countries should be prepared for “periodic” outbreaks. The report said containment will be so challenging due, in part, to the fact that so many of those infected are asymptomatic, according to Bloomberg.

It has been widely reported that without a proven treatment, vaccine or cure, governments will have to limit social interaction. The coronavirus is considered highly contagious and most dangerous for the elderly population and those with comorbidities. Health officials in the U.S. believe that shelter-in-place orders contributed to a lower-than-expected infection rate.

Dr. Anthony Fauci, the director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, told a coronavirus press briefing earlier last month that the world may never return to the “normal” that was known before the outbreak.

"When we get back to normal, we will go back to the point where we can function as a society,” he said.  He continued, “If you want to get back to pre-coronavirus, that might not ever happen in the sense that the threat is there."