MANUFACTURING
VACCINES AGAINST SARS-COV-2 Current situation and future perspectives
Safe and effective vaccines to prevent COVID-19 caused by Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARSCoV-2) have been developed within a year after the onset of the pandemic. As of December 2021, 54.5 per cent of the world population had received at least one dose, but Africa is lagging behind. Full, lasting protection against severe disease will require two doses plus a booster, and preferably incorporating emerging virus variants such as omicron. Ger Rijkers, Science Department, University College Roosevelt Microvida Laboratory for Medical Microbiology and Immunology, St Elizabeth Hospital
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P H A RM A F O C U S A S I A
ISSUE 44 46 - 2021 2022
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s a rule of thumb in epidemiology, the world faces a pandemic once every 100 years. The previous one was the Spanish flu in 1918. At the end of World War I, a new strain of the influenza virus, H1N1, broke out in the United States. The disease mainly affected young adults, initially recruits in army camps, who were in training to be sent to Europe. Ultimately, more American soldiers died from the flu than in the battlefields of Europe. During wartime, most news-
