{"id":238071,"date":"2020-07-20T12:47:43","date_gmt":"2020-07-20T11:47:43","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/arewa.ng\/?p=238071"},"modified":"2020-07-20T12:48:05","modified_gmt":"2020-07-20T11:48:05","slug":"who-chief-scientist-thinks-mid-2021-is-possible","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/arewa.ng\/?p=238071","title":{"rendered":"WHO chief scientist thinks mid-2021 is possible &#8211;"},"content":{"rendered":"<div itemprop=\"description\"><img fetchpriority=\"high\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"aligncenter wp-image-1385691 size-full jetpack-lazy-image\" src=\"https:\/\/i1.wp.com\/www.vanguardngr.com\/inc\/uploads\/2020\/04\/COVID-VACCINE.gif?resize=634%2C395&amp;ssl=1\" alt=\"vaccine\" width=\"634\" height=\"395\" data-recalc-dims=\"1\" data-lazy-src=\"https:\/\/i1.wp.com\/www.vanguardngr.com\/inc\/uploads\/2020\/04\/COVID-VACCINE.gif?resize=634%2C395&amp;is-pending-load=1#038;ssl=1\" srcset=\"data:image\/gif;base64,R0lGODlhAQABAIAAAAAAAP\/\/\/yH5BAEAAAAALAAAAAABAAEAAAIBRAA7\" animated-media=\"animated-media\"><\/p>\n<p>Widespread coronavirus vaccination could begin in the middle of next year, the chief scientist of the World Health Organisation, Soumya  Swaminathan said.<\/p>\n<p><!-- --><\/p>\n<p>She expressed cautious optimism about the state of the research and development process in an interview with dpa.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cWe have now over 20 candidates in clinical studies.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cSo we are hopeful that a couple of them will work. It would be very unlucky if all of them fail,\u201d Swaminathan added.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cSo if we are very practical, then we are looking at the middle of 2021 when we will have a vaccine that can be widely deployed,\u201d she said, adding: \u201cOf course it\u2019s impossible to predict.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Swaminathan said the global race to develop a vaccine had been \u201cthe fastest timeline we have ever seen,\u201d noting that there were only three months between the time the virus\u2019 genetic sequence was published in January and the time the first trial began.<\/p>\n<p>The novel coronavirus was first detected in Wuhan, China, late last year.<\/p>\n<p>It has since spread to almost every corner of the globe, killing more than 600,000 people and infecting more than 14 million.<\/p>\n<p>The U.S. leads the world in confirmed cases.<\/p>\n<p>The pandemic\u2019s epicentre has shifted from China to Europe, to the Americas, leading to lockdowns and tough restrictions on public life and travel.<\/p>\n<p>Some places where the virus was brought under control are seeing an uptick in cases, fanning fears of a second wave of infections and a new round of restrictions.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Widespread coronavirus vaccination could begin in the middle of next year, the chief scientist of the World Health Organisation, Soumya Swaminathan said. She expressed cautious optimism about the state of the research and development process in an interview with dpa. \u201cWe have now over 20 candidates in clinical studies. \u201cSo we are hopeful that a [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":234470,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[14571,3],"tags":[15196,1968],"class_list":["post-238071","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-health","category-news","tag-pronavirus","tag-who"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/arewa.ng\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/238071","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/arewa.ng\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/arewa.ng\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/arewa.ng\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/arewa.ng\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=238071"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/arewa.ng\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/238071\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/arewa.ng\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/234470"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/arewa.ng\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=238071"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/arewa.ng\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=238071"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/arewa.ng\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=238071"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}