During testimony before the Senate Committee on Health, Education, Labor and Pensions on Tuesday, Dr. Anthony Fauci stated he is “cautiously optimistic” that a COVID-19 vaccine candidate will get an efficacy signal, but said, “there’s no guarantee that the vaccine is actually going to be effective.”
Fauci: “No Guarantee” Coronavirus Vaccine Will Be Effective
…meanwhile Newsom wants to wait for a vaccine to reopen. pic.twitter.com/JJ2GvFGljP
— Alex Marlow (@AlexMarlow) May 12, 2020
“There’s no guarantee that the vaccine is actually going to be effective,” Fauci told the senators after being asked about the rapid development of a coronavirus vaccine.
“You can have everything you think that’s in place and you don’t induce the kind of immune response that turns out to be protective and durably protective,” he continued. “So one of the big unknowns is, will it be effective? Given the way the body responds to viruses of this type, I’m cautiously optimistic that we will with one of the candidates get an efficacy signal.”
Fauci also touched on the possibility of an “enhancement effect” where the vaccine induces a suboptimal response and a person who is exposed experiences an enhanced pathogenesis of the disease.
Despite these possibilities, Fauci remains “cautiously optimistic” a vaccine with an efficacy percentage high enough to induce a herd immunity will be found.
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