To tackle the new coronavirus, scientists are accelerating the vaccine process

Friday, February 21, 2020 - 11:10 in Health & Medicine

As a mystery illness started spreading in China in late December, researchers at Inovio Pharmaceuticals were keeping a close eye on what was happening, even before anyone knew the cause was a coronavirus. The company, based in San Diego, is no stranger to the viruses. After MERS, which is caused by a different coronavirus, emerged in 2012, Inovio was one of the first to develop a still-experimental vaccine for the disease. In the new outbreak, as soon as Chinese researchers posted the genetic makeup of the virus, dubbed SARS-CoV-2, the company’s scientists sprang into action. “We’d all hoped that there would be enough overlap that our previously developed MERS vaccine would be helpful in this case,” says Kate Broderick, Inovio’s senior vice president for research and development. Like MERS and SARS, the new virus is a coronavirus that uses RNA as its genetic material. But in-depth analysis revealed that the two coronaviruses are too different for a vaccine against MERS, also known as Middle East...

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