The COVID-19 pandemic is one of the worst disasters to affect humankind in the last century. While other infectious diseases like the flu and HIV have taken more lives, no other infectious epidemic in the last 100 years has so greatly influenced us.The societies therefore need to initiate mass vaccinations with an effective COVID-19 vaccine as soon as possible-but as of June 24, 2020, no vaccine was available.An unprecedented vaccine development race has therefore kicked off. More than 140 vaccines are being developed, and 16 of them are already being tested in humans. This gives us hope that an effective vaccine is within sight-although it may not be just around the corner. In this book, readers will learn how vaccines are developed, manufactured, and tested to ensure that any COVID-19 vaccine will protect the vaccinated person and not lead to any harm. They’ll also learn how our immune system reacts to vaccines and makes us immune to any future infection by the COVID-19 virus. The development of new vaccines and their testing in animals are explained. The testing of vaccines in humans in clinical trials is outlined, and the different phases of clinical trials are explained. The term reproduction number is presented, and its importance for the degree of population immunity to end the COVID-19 pandemic is explained. Each major technology for developing and manufacturing vaccines is outlined. The readers will learn about inactivated vaccines, live attenuated vaccines, viral vector vaccines, protein subunit vaccines, RNA vaccines, and DNA vaccines. Key examples of previous successes of vaccines, such as the complete eradication of smallpox, are presented. The major disasters in vaccine development are also mentioned-to stress that in all vaccine development, safety is of the highest priority. The readers will also learn about the 16 frontrunners in the race to bring such a vaccine to the market. Each 16 lead candidates that are already in clinical trials are described in detail, and each candidate’s likelihood of success is analyzed.The COVID-19 vaccine landscape is rapidly changing. The book therefore gives the readers the needed knowledge and tools to evaluate new vaccine candidates that enter clinical trials. After reading the book, the readers will be able to judge whether it’s at all realistic to expect effective COVID-19 vaccines to be available in 2020-and whether they can end the pandemic, open up our societies and borders, and bring our lives back to normal.The book has been written for the general adult reader who wants to know more about COVID-19 vaccines and the likelihood that they will soon be available. The book may also be of interest to healthcare workers, journalists, analysts, and other professionals. The author has attempted to keep the Flesch-Kincaid readability level to between the 10th and 12th grades. The use of formulas has been minimized, and an understanding of maths is not needed to fully comprehend the book. The book goes into some depth regarding immunology and vaccine development, but it does not assume that the reader has any previous knowledge about natural sciences. Any scientific term that is needed to comprehend a vaccine technology is explained in an easy-to-understand way.At the end of each chapter, there is an updated list of references. Most of the references are from 2020. In-text citations have been omitted in order to simplify the text and make it easier to read.The technical editing of the book ended on June 24, 2020. This means that new COVID-19 vaccines entering testing in humans after this date are not described. However, as mentioned, the readers will have enough knowledge to evaluate any new candidate.
