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Coronavirus: Researchers Begin Trials of Vaccine

A team of researchers in London has begun recruiting volunteers for clinical trials of a vaccine against COVID-19, while another team has started work on a treatment that may help critically ill patients recover from the disease.

Research at the Jenner Institute at Oxford University, carried out in conjunction with an organization called the Oxford Vaccine Group, has been ongoing since January, with scientists now looking to recruit in excess of 10,000 people to take part in further trials following preliminary efforts in April.

The trial, now in its second phase following preliminary testing on a small sample size of 160 patients, will involve people of all age demographics — from children older than 5 years to the elderly — to help test the effectiveness of the vaccine, called ChAdOx1 nCoV-19, in a wider variety of people.

Preparation for mass production of the vaccine is already underway in anticipation of the trial proving successful.

The Oxford team has said it expects to have around a million units of the vaccine ready for use by September should that prove to be the case.

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