What is the purpose of this trial?
The purpose of this study is to test a new vaccine against COVID-19 in healthy volunteers.
A new virus causing respiratory disease emerged in Wuhan, China in December 2019 and has since rapidly spread to many other countries around the world, despite unprecedented containment efforts. The virus is part of the Coronavirus family which may cause respiratory infections ranging from the common cold to more severe diseases. This recently discovered coronavirus causes coronavirus disease COVID-19.
Common symptoms of COVID-19 include fever, tiredness, and dry cough. Whilst about 80% of infected people have only mild symptoms and will recover from the disease without needing special treatment, 1 in every 6 people who gets COVID-19 becomes seriously ill. Older people and those with underlying medical problems are more likely to develop serious illness. Thousands of deaths have been reported so far.
The WHO declared the COVID-19 epidemic a Public Health Emergency of International Concern on 30th January 2020. There are no currently licensed vaccines or specific treatments for COVID-19. Vaccines are the most cost effective way of controlling outbreaks and the international community have stepped-up their efforts towards developing one against COVID-19.
This study will enable us to assess if healthy people can be protected from COVID-19 with this new vaccine called ChAdOx1 nCoV-19. It will also give us valuable information on safety aspects of the vaccine and its ability to generate good immune responses against the virus. We will do this by randomly allocating participants to receive the vaccine or a placebo injection in addition to doing blood tests and collecting information about any symptoms that occur after vaccination.
If you would like any further information regarding the study please visit
https://www.covid19vaccinetrial.co.uk/