- The chances of securing either a coronavirus vaccine or an effective treatment for COVID-19 in the next year are “incredibly small,” according to the UK’s chief medical officer.
- Professor Chris Whitty said many of the existing social distancing rules would need to remain in place instead.
- The chief executive of the pharmaceutical giant Roche told reporters this week that scientists would be unlikely to find a vaccine before the end of 2021.
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The chances of securing an effective vaccine or treatment for the coronavirus this year are “incredibly small,” the UK’s top medical adviser has warned.
Professor Chris Whitty, the chief medical officer, said on Wednesday that the UK would have no choice but to retain at least some of the social distancing measures currently in place.
“In the long run, the exit from this is going to be one of two things, ideally,” Whitty said at the UK government’s daily coronavirus press briefing.
“A vaccine, and there are a variety of ways they can be deployed … or highly effective drugs so that people stop dying of this disease even if they catch it, or which can prevent this disease in vulnerable people.”
He added: “Until we have those, and the probability of having those any time in the next calendar year is incredibly small, we should be realistic that we’re going to have to rely on other social measures, which of course are very socially disruptive as everyone is finding at the moment.”
Whitty said the government’s focus should be on ensuring the so-called “R number” — the average number of people one infected person transmits the virus to — remains below one. If it rises above one, the number of people infected with the virus would rise exponentially and threaten to overwhelm the NHS.
The social distancing measures introduced by Boris Johnson in March brought the R number below one within the general population, the government believes. Ministers and scientific advisers are currently considering which measures they can lift without taking it above one again.
“What we are trying to work out is what are the things that add up to an R of less than one,” Whitty said.
“That narrows our options quite significantly. We are going to have to do a lot of things for really quite a long period of time, the question is what is the best package. If you release more on one area you have to keep onboard more of another area so there’s a proper trade-off, and this is what ministers are having to consider.”
His comments came after the chief executive of the Swiss pharmaceutical giants Roche said this week that scientists would be unlikely to secure a vaccine before the end of 2020.
“I’m afraid that the most likely scenario is that we will not have a vaccine before the end of next year,” Severin Schwan said on a Wednesday conference call, adding that an 18-month timeline is “very ambitious.”