London Daily

Focus on the big picture.
Wednesday, Oct 01, 2025

Coronavirus: developing a vaccine is one problem to solve, getting people to use it is another

Coronavirus: developing a vaccine is one problem to solve, getting people to use it is another

Vaccination hesitancy may harm the chances of reopening communities. Medical experts say rapid vaccine development is causing public anxiety but wide-scale immunisation may be the only route back to a safe society
Shanghai mother Julia Wei has been closely following Covid-19 vaccine development updates. As a frequent business traveller, she believes an effective vaccine will be the key to a return to social and economic normalcy.

Yet as progress is made – four out of seven candidates developed in China are being tested for broader safety and efficacy before they can get regulatory approval– Wei said she and her six-year-old daughter would be unlikely to voluntarily get a Covid-19 jab. The public has been told a vaccine might be available as soon as the end of this year, or early next year.

“I read that vaccine development usually takes years, but for Covid-19 it’s only several months. This is just too fast – I don’t want to be a guinea pig,” Wei said. “I will just wait until we know for absolutely sure that they are safe and effective.”

Wei is not opposed to vaccines. She has had her daughter inoculated with free government vaccines as well as some that are not part of China’s immunisation programme that Wei believed were necessary.

But concerns such as Wei’s are casting a shadow over vaccination and its potential to reopen society or allow the community to reach “herd immunity”
– the concept that enough people in a population are immune to a disease that transmission becomes unlikely.

The hesitancy is shared in other countries. In a Gallup tracking survey released this month, over 35 per cent of Americans indicated they were reluctant to be vaccinated, even if a Covid-19 vaccine were approved by the US Food and Drug Administration and provided free.

A similar survey by the Angus Reid Institute in Canada showed that about 32 per cent of those surveyed were hesitant and would wait before getting vaccinated, while a further 14 per cent said they would not have the Covid-19 vaccine at all.

Even before the Covid-19 crisis, the World Health Organisation declared vaccination hesitancy – the reluctance or refusal to vaccinate despite the availability of vaccines – one of the top 10 threats to global health last year.

Measles cases, for example, have jumped globally. Even though not all of these cases are because of vaccine hesitancy, some countries that were close to eliminating the disease have seen a resurgence.

“People are concerned because they keep hearing that the vaccines process is being so accelerated that our major vaccine programme is called Operation Warp Speed, almost implying something unnatural about how fast it is going,” said Margaret Hamburg, former commissioner of the US Food and Drug Administration in a webinar with Peking University three weeks ago.

“We also talked about manufacturing risk, which is really a financial risk because the governments and companies are actually investing resources in making vaccines in large numbers so that they can rapidly be deployed when those vaccines make it to the finishing line in terms of proving their benefit in safety and efficacy. But when people hear vaccines are made of risk that adds to the concerns.”

Vaccine experts say they understand why some people are hesitant, but that they should not be concerned about the development process.

There was no indication there would be short cuts in the vaccine approval and licensing process because FDA guidance on Covid-19 vaccines was clear and comprehensive, said Wilbur Chen, a professor of medicine at the University of Maryland School of Medicine.

“People should not have major concerns for the safety or effectiveness of Covid-19 vaccines if they are licensed on the basis of well-performed studies that adhere to the FDA’s guidelines,” Chen said.

It was possible that very rare adverse events would be detected only after a drug was licensed, which was not unique to Covid-19 vaccines but could apply to any drug or vaccine, Chen added.

Stephen Evans, professor of pharmacoepidemiology at the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine, said it was understandable that people were reluctant but he believed regulators in Britain or the European Union would not approve a vaccine without being presented with convincing evidence of efficacy, that it actually prevented Covid-19 infection and disease, rather than just triggering an immune response.

“I think that the speed is due to a number of factors and I do not see that the process has, so far at least, been deficient. Risks because of quick development would be almost entirely related to the numbers included in a trial,” Evans said. “What is required is sufficient numbers, both to show efficacy in preventing disease and in showing no serious harm.”

Apart from distrust in governments, institutions or aspects of immunisation, industry insiders said there was also complacency concern, the feeling that it might not be worth the trouble if there was no guarantee the vaccine protected against the virus. The target efficacy for Covid-19 vaccines is 50 per cent in China, the US and under the WHO guidelines, similar to the seasonal flu shot. And like flu shots, people might not think it is worth having the jab.

But according to experts, getting vaccinated is important not only for self-protection but also for the community. When a certain percentage of a population becomes immune to an infectious disease, usually through a vaccine, it creates a shield so that even if someone gets infected, the pathogen cannot be spread among the community, achieving herd immunity and protecting those who have not been vaccinated or who have a weakened immune system.

Jonathan Ball, a professor of molecular virology with the University of Nottingham, said the vaccine coverage needed for that herd immunity effect would be determined by its effectiveness. Does it prevent infection and/or onwards transmission or does it stop symptoms but still allow the spread?

“If the vaccine stops onwards transmission and the reproduction number [an indicator of contagiousness of a pathogen] is 3 then we would estimate that 66 per cent of vaccine coverage using a vaccine that is nearly 100 per cent effective would provide herd immunity and stop outbreaks,” Ball said. Many factors in the calculation remained unknown for now, he added.

Chen said that even if a vaccine was found to have moderate efficacy, using it would still help the community.

There could still be a lot of illness, medical care visits, hospital admissions and deaths avoided, so an “imperfect” vaccine could still have a significant effect in a population, he said.

“More people … taking the vaccine will improve that effect in the population. So vaccine hesitancy – or even failing to observe physical distancing, wearing masks and hand hygiene – will be an impediment or delay to safe reopening,” Chen said.

He said that for countries where Covid-19 was under control, vaccination still made sense because the situation had been achieved through short-term measures to cut off transmission – staying home, wearing masks, physical distancing and cancelling large gatherings. And even those nations still had occasional outbreaks.

“Therefore, the only long-term solution allowing the country to be able to safely reopen is wide-scale immunisation with effective vaccines,” Chen said.
Newsletter

Related Articles

0:00
0:00
Close
Trump Administration Launches “TrumpRx” Plan to Enable Direct Drug Sales at Deep Discounts
Trump Announces Intention to Impose 100 Percent Tariff on Foreign-Made Films
Altman Says GPT-5 Already Outpaces Him, Warns AI Could Automate 40% of Work
Singapore and Hong Kong Vie to Dominate Asia’s Rising Gold Trade
Trump Organization Teams with Saudi Developer on $1 Billion Trump Plaza in Jeddah
Manhattan Sees Surge in Office-to-Housing Conversions, Highest Since 2008
Switzerland and U.S. Issue Joint Assurance Against Currency Manipulation
Electronic Arts to Be Taken Private in Historic $55 Billion Buyout
Thomas Jacob Sanford Named as Suspect in Deadly Michigan Church Shooting and Arson
Russian Research Vessel 'Yantar' Tracked Mapping Europe’s Subsea Cables, Raising Security Alarms
New York Man Arrested After On-Air Confession to 2017 Parents’ Murders
U.S. Defense Chief Orders Sudden Summit of Hundreds of Generals and Admirals
Global Cruise Industry Posts Dramatic Comeback with 34.6 Million Passengers in 2024
Trump Claims FBI Planted 274 Agents at Capitol Riot, Citing Unverified Reports
India: Internet Suspended in Bareilly Amid Communal Clashes Between Muslims and Hindus
Supreme Court Extends Freeze on Nearly $5 Billion in U.S. Foreign Aid at Trump’s Request
Archaeologists Recover Statues and Temples from 2,000-Year-Old Sunken City off Alexandria
China Deploys 2,000 Workers to Spain to Build Major EV Battery Factory, Raising European Dependence
Speed Takes Over: How Drive-Through Coffee Chains Are Rewriting U.S. Coffee Culture
U.S. Demands Brussels Scrutinize Digital Rules to Prevent Bias Against American Tech
Ringo Starr Champions Enduring Beatles Legacy While Debuting Las Vegas Art Show
Private Equity’s Fundraising Surge Triggers Concern of European Market Shake-Out
Colombian President Petro Vows to Mobilize Volunteers for Gaza and Joins List of Fighters
FBI Removes Agents Who Kneeled at 2020 Protest, Citing Breach of Professional Conduct
Trump Alleges ‘Triple Sabotage’ at United Nations After Escalator and Teleprompter Failures
Shock in France: 5 Years in Prison for Former President Nicolas Sarkozy
Tokyo’s Jimbōchō Named World’s Coolest Neighbourhood for 2025
European Officials Fear Trump May Shift Blame for Ukraine War onto EU
BNP Paribas Abandons Ban on 'Controversial Weapons' Financing Amid Europe’s Defence Push
Typhoon Ragasa Leaves Trail of Destruction Across East Asia Before Making Landfall in China
The Personality Rights Challenge in India’s AI Era
Big Banks Rebuild in Hong Kong as Deal Volume Surges
Italy Considers Freezing Retirement Age at 67 to Avert Scheduled Hike
Italian City to Impose Tax on Visiting Dogs Starting in 2026
Arnault Denounces Proposed Wealth Tax as Threat to French Economy
Study Finds No Safe Level of Alcohol for Dementia Risk
Denmark Investigates Drone Incursion, Does Not Rule Out Russian Involvement
Lilly CEO Warns UK Is ‘Worst Country in Europe’ for Drug Prices, Pulls Back Investment
Nigel Farage Emerges as Central Force in British Politics with Reform UK Surge
Disney Reinstates ‘Jimmy Kimmel Live!’ after Six-Day Suspension over Charlie Kirk Comments
U.S. Prosecutors Move to Break Up Google’s Advertising Monopoly
Nvidia Pledges Up to $100 Billion Investment in OpenAI to Power Massive AI Data Center Build-Out
U.S. Signals ‘Large and Forceful’ Support for Argentina Amid Market Turmoil
Nvidia and Abu Dhabi’s TII Launch First AI-&-Robotics Lab in the Middle East
Vietnam Faces Up to $25 Billion Export Loss as U.S. Tariffs Bite
Europe Signals Stronger Support for Taiwan at Major Taipei Defence Show
Indonesia Court Upholds Military Law Amid Concerns Over Expanded Civilian Role
Larry Ellison, Michael Dell and Rupert Murdoch Join Trump-Backed Bid to Take Over TikTok
Trump and Musk Reunite Publicly for First Time Since Fallout at Kirk Memorial
Vietnam Closes 86 Million Untouched Bank Accounts Over Biometric ID Rules
×