Moderna leads the way with vaccine development.

Moderna Vaccine

Moderna looks to be the strongest vaccine candidate. Oxford fans will likely disagree. File this under healthy competition.The Free Market at its best.

Some more thoughts on vaccines. I posted this on my facebook page.

Should one take the vaccine when it does becomes available? 

 If you are vulnerable it is worth taking in my opinion.. The concern, which does have justification, is that there is a possibility that in the rush to develop the vaccine certain steps may have been overlooked (most center around the human trials). Side effects are another issue. From what I have read vaccine developers are doing their very best to address these issues. Remember they can't afford to mess up either as these vaccines are at the center point of a global focus. Any mess up kills credibility. The stakes are high. in the US you have FDA oversight which is very rigorous (more so than in Canada from what people in the pharmacology industry have told me). The other problem (which isn't helping at all) is that there is a great deal of Anti-vaxxer propaganda out there that is spreading all sorts of false information.

Does everyone need to take it?

The most vulnerable ought to be. No question there. However for the rest of the population a vaccination rate of 60-70% will probably suffice, That will drop the R nought for the virus substantially below 1.0 which in effect will kill spread. The whole idea behind vaccines is that they allow us to reach the herd immunity status faster with minimum life cost. 

But what about viral mutations? Also 60-70% of Americans may not agree to be vaccinated?

The virus mutate and we will deal with it in the same way we do with the seasonal flu. In fact many of the seasonal flu viruses are mutations of the Hong Kong flu from 1968. Some may hark back to the Spanish flu pandemic of 1918. Later strains though have a tendency to be less severe. Also once we have the protocols and scientific methodologies in places for vaccine development for this particular virus it will be easier to develop subsequent vaccines. One positive point is that the virus itself appears to have a lower mutation rate than once thought. As for the 60-70% number it may not to be that high if a substantial portion of the population is already carrying antibodies. For those living in NYC this number may already be 20-30% of the population.It was estimated be about 21% a month or so ago.