Chinese Military Docs Develop Novel Coronavirus (COVID-19) Vaccine

A research team lead by an academician at the China's People's Liberation Army (PLA) Academy of Military Medical Sciences has claimed to have achieved a major breakthrough in developing a vaccine to novel coronavirus that has now spread to over 70 countries worldwide.

Led by PLA major general Chen Wei, the team has now achieved a key progress in developing a vaccine to the novel coronavirus. It includes development of an adenovirus vector vaccine for COVID-19 and a class 1 biological drug with full intellectual property rights, which can be used to treat not only COVID-19 patients, but also people who have been exposed to the virus as an emergency prevention measure, state-run CCTV reported on Tuesday.

"We must strive to bring the vaccine we are working on to clinical trial and application, providing strong technological support for winning this battle," she said.

Chen is said to have worked on fighting SARS and Ebola viruses previously. "Chen led the team working on world's first gene-based Ebola vaccine in 2014. She was well-known for her efforts in combatting the SARS outbreak from 2002 to 2003, and her research on broad-spectrum antiviral drug had played a key role in fighting the disease," Global Times reported citing sciencenet.cn.

"Chinese scientists have now managed to separate some high-quality antibodies, and they hope to transform some of the latest research results with these antibody vaccines into practice and serve the people as soon as possible," said Zhang Linqi, a professor at the School of Medicine at Tsinghua University in Beijing.

The Chinese military has deployed over 4,000 medical workers in Wuhan, the city where the virus first broke out. They have recorded zero infection and played active role in working on scientific research, according to a press conference on Monday. The work included joint research on nucleic acid testing kits for fast testing, medicine research, antibodies and vaccines research.

The coronavirus has infected 93,000 people in over 75 countries and has claimed 3,200 lives over the last 3 months.