The scientists behind the Oxford AstraZeneca Covid-19 vaccine provided a vivid illustration of the many challenges they faced and overcame.
The inspiration for Vaxxers: The Inside Story of the Oxford AstraZeneca Vaccine and the Race against the Virus, published July 8 by Hodder & Stoughton, came while Catherine Green, Director of the University of Oxford’s Clinical Biomanufacturing Facility, was on a camping trip in August 2020. She happened upon a conversation with a woman who said to her, “I’m not saying that there is definitely a conspiracy. But I worry that we don’t know what’s in these vaccines: mercury and other toxic chemicals. I don’t trust them. You’re not telling the truth. “
Dr. Green could only answer: “I am ‘she’. You couldn’t have known this, but I’m the best person in the world who can tell you what’s in the vaccine. I work with the people who invented it … We ordered the ingredients, we made the first batch, we made other batches out of it, like a sourdough starter, we cleaned it and put it in tiny little bottles … I know exactly what is im [the vaccine]and you can ask me what you want. “
Readers now have a similar opportunity to discover for themselves what is going on in a vaccine laboratory.
Sarah Gilbert, Professor of Vaccinology at Jenner Institute, Oxford, explains the nature of “replication-deficient recombinant monkey-vector adenoviral vaccines” and how previous research provided an essential basis for the rapid development of a new vaccine.
“Some of the most important moments actually happened before anyone had ever heard of Covid-19,” she recalls. “Because when you work on the cutting edge of science, you build on decades of meticulous and painstaking work that has existed before. The downside is, of course, that if we had been better prepared, we could have gone even faster. “
Many factors, Professor Gilbert continues, explain “why vaccines usually take so long to develop”. After the Ebola epidemic of 2014, she writes, the World Health Organization “jumped into action” and a coalition for innovations to prepare for epidemics was founded. Although she spent much of her family vacation putting together a full proposal for very focused research, it still took well over a year to sign the contract. “And we hadn’t achieved anything except to secure funding.”
But these were by no means the only obstacles that scientists had to overcome. When the Oxford AstraZeneca vaccine was licensed and launched, the two women faced a media circus – and often outright hostility – for which few academics are prepared.
Despite “the overwhelming success of the first three vaccines to show results – Pfizer, Moderna and our AstraZeneca vaccine,” Professor Gilbert reminds us, several other promising contenders have had to give up. So she occasionally allowed herself to be “a little sore … that we continued to get bad press for our successful vaccine while others received compassion for their unsuccessful attempts”.
On the often controversial topics related to women in science, Dr. Green is a fairly robust line, but admits that “some things are … particularly challenging” and notes that she and her colleagues have sometimes been described in terms like “irish brunette mother” by two “,” serious red-haired mother of triplets ” and “not your stereotypical Oxford maniac”. She is also pleased to list “for the record” the hair color of the three captains with whom they have worked.
Equally irritating was the way in which “our year of constant, meticulous attention to detail that resulted in a vaccine that has the potential to save millions of lives around the world was dismissed with resentment by a politician” . A particularly difficult moment was when voices within Europe seem to be crying out and discrediting for the same vaccine. Professor Gilbert was reminded of “the joke about the two quirky old women in a restaurant. First quirky old woman: ‘The food here is awful.’ Second cranky old woman: ‘Yes, and such small portions.’ “
matthew.reisz@timeshighereducation.com
source https://collegeeducationnewsllc.com/the-story-behind-the-oxford-astrazeneca-vaccine/
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