COVID-19: vaccine's progress

Under the pressure of the COVID-19 pandemic, vaccines were developed and rolled out into mass vaccination campaigns at incredible speed. What normally takes a decade was worked out within a year. Vaccines were produced along many different platforms ranging from inactivated whole virus vaccines over adenovirus-vectored vaccines, recombinant protein vaccines and nanoparticles to mRNA vaccines. Several vaccines went through preclinical testing and completed successful phase 1 to phase 3 clinical trials. The first evaluations of national vaccination campaigns document astonishing high levels of protection against disease. The present article summarizes the published reports leading to these striking achievements with vaccines based on different concepts.

Automated summary

Under the pressure of the COVID-19 pandemic, vaccines were developed and rolled out at an unprecedented speed, with various platforms such as inactivated whole virus vaccines, adenovirus-vectored vaccines, recombinant protein vaccines, nanoparticles, and mRNA vaccines. Multiple vaccines underwent successful clinical trials, showing high levels of protection against disease in national vaccination campaigns.