The Department of Health and Human Services has announced an agreement to purchase 100 million doses of a candidate COVID-19 vaccine for $1.95 billion ($20 per dose) subject to efficacy.

Pfizer recently announced that one of the candidate vaccines produced using technology developed by BioNTech of Germany stimulated antibody production and has now progressed to Phase Two evaluation. Similar announcements have been made for the Astra-Zeneca Oxford vaccine and other candidates.

If development proceeds as planned, one of the various candidate vaccines might be approved by the end of October and could be supplied in commercial quantities during the first quarter of 2021.

The announcement follows new concern as to the actual protective ability of antibodies against SARS-CoV-2 and also the durability of  antibodies. This is based on studies demonstrating decay of antibody as measured by ELISA assay in patients recovering from COVID-19 and anecdotal reports of re-infection. It is also possible that mutations in the SARS-CoV-2 genome may require periodic modification of vaccines although the basic technology and manufacturing capacity would be in place to effect modifications to maintain efficacy.

Even if a suitable vaccine is available in early 2021 the current social climate poisoned by misinformation and political polarization will detract from attaining the level of herd immunity required to suppress the incidence rate of infection. The population of the World will be obliged to continue preventive measures that have proved successful in nations such as Taiwan, Germany and South Korea for many years with or without effective vaccines.

Operation Warpspeed supports research, development and manufacturing capability of pharmaceutical companies with promising vaccine candidates.