Johnson & Johnson says it’s ready to start human studies of its experimental coronavirus vaccine very soon.
The company told CNBC Thursday that it plans to begin late-stage human trial for a potential coronavirus vaccine in late September. According to the WSJ, Johnson & Johnson will begin an initial study enrolling at least 1,000 “healthy adults” on Wednesday in Belgium.
Chief Scientific Officer Paul Stoffels told US News World Report that J&J is discussing the potential development of the vaccine with the National Institutes of Health.
Moderna along with the National Institutes of Health announced a milestone earlier this week in its development of a vaccine.
On Tuesday reports of another experimental vaccine ready for final testing, developed by Dr. Anthony Fauci’s colleagues at the National Institutes of Health and Moderna Inc., is expected to make its most important step around July 27: a 30,000-person study to prove if the shots really are strong enough to protect against the coronavirus.
Researchers from that study reported that 45 early volunteers developed what are called neutralizing antibodies in their bloodstream — molecules key to blocking infection — at levels comparable to those found in people who survived COVID-19, the research team reported in the New England Journal of Medicine.
People think “this is a race for one winner. Me, I’m cheering every one of them on,” Fauci told The Associated Press.
“We need multiple vaccines. We need vaccines for the world, not only for our own country,” he said.
Around the world, governments are investing in stockpiles of hundreds of millions of doses of the different candidates in hopes of speedily starting inoculations if any are proven to work.
The Associated Press contributed to this story.
