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Covid-19 will not suddenly disappear, but it will start to fade into the background

Needle and spread

Vaccines are coming, but their deployment faces many obstacles, says Edward
Carr

FOR A WORLD that desperately needs to be vaccinated against SARS-CoV-2,

the virus that causes covid-19, 2021 will be a frustration sandwich—two thick

slices of good news, wrapped around a layer of conflict, delay and

disappointment. Policymakers should try to make that filling palatable. Many

thousands of lives will depend on their efforts.

The first slice of good news is that the next six months will see lots more new vaccines
to complement the successful candidate from Pfizer-BioNTech. That is a testament to
the power of scientific collaboration. Vaccines used to take 10-20 years to create, but
today there are more than 320 projects, including dozens in advanced clinical trials.
What’s more, this work is yielding valuable advances in vaccine research, as teams
attack the virus from different angles. Some vaccines take the old-fashioned route of
using an attenuated virus. Others, like the Pfizer vaccine, are breaking new ground by,