Israeli Institute May Be On Verge Of Coronavirus Vaccine

The MIGAL Galilee Research Institute in Israel has developed a vaccine against coronavirus in birds and hopes to soon do the same for the new coronavirus in humans.

Ofir Akunis, Israel’s Minister of Science and Technology, has ordered all approval processes to be fast-tracked with the goal of bringing the human vaccine to market as quickly as possible.

Dr. Nady Gruzdev, 41, a specialist in molecular microbiology who is in charge of producing the vaccine at MIGAL, told The Jewish Press that the vaccine can be finished “in a matter of weeks.” Animal and human testing, however, “could take up to three months.”

She added, “Of course, bureaucratic problems and receiving all the required health and safety permits could hold things up. Afterwards, the vaccine has to be manufactured and bottled. That part of the operation will be handled by a drug manufacturer. That too takes time. All in all, it may take a year.”

She said, “During our research…we discovered that the poultry coronavirus has high genetic similarity to the human strain of COVID-19, and that it uses the same infection mechanism, a fact that increases the likelihood of achieving an effective human vaccine via genetic adjustments in a very short period of time.”

“We all have the feeling that we can produce the miracle that the world is hoping for,” she said.