By
Steve Muchoki
April 16th, 2024
Dow Jones is in green as stocks were lifted amid the hopes that new treatments will soon be brought to fight against the Wuhan coronavirus which has stricken China and spread to other parts of the globe.
The Dow Jones Industrial Average finished the Wednesday trading in the green after the news that a potential coronavirus vaccine has been developed in Britain. What is actually happening is that the researcher leading United Kingdom’s efforts to find an effective coronavirus vaccine said on Wednesday his team has made a “significant breakthrough” by reducing normal development time from “two to three years to just 14 days.”
The Chinese government reported that the number of infected people from coronavirus in China passed 28,000. A Chinese media announced that a baby had been diagnosed with the virus just 30 hours after birth.
The death toll allegedly reached 560 people and meanwhile, Japan Health Ministry confirmed that 10 more people on board a cruise ship in Japan had also tested positive to the virus.
Vaccine Could be Ready in the Summer
In a statement Professor Robin Shattock, a researcher at Imperial College London, pointed out that he is at the stage of testing the vaccine on animals as early as next week, noting that studies in humans could begin in the summer provided that enough funding is secured.
He said:
“Conventional approaches usually take at least two to three years before you even get to the clinic. And we’ve gone from that sequence to generating a candidate in the laboratory in 14 days.”
The vaccine will pass through the animal probes next week. If the funding is secured, the plan is to begin testing on humans this summer.
This is a third day in a row that Dow Jones opened in the green. Investors seem to be shrugging off the fears of widespread coronavirus panic. It ended trading 1.68% higher.
The S&P 500 was up 1.13% while the Nasdaq Composite grew 0.36%.
Little Can Be Done Now
Even though the breakthrough regarding the vaccine is important, for now, it seems a little can be done in order to stop the immediate threat.
Sky News reported:
“The vaccine will be too late for this current outbreak but it will be crucial if there is another one.”
Shattock said his team’s vaccine could be critical if the coronavirus evolved into a global pandemic during one year or if a second wave happens after the warmer summer months.
The thing is, analysts are becoming more and more nervous about the economic impact in China and on the global field. Teams of scientists all over the world are now racing to find a cure. In one breakthrough, Thai doctors discharged six patients after using a cocktail of flu and HIV treatments.
Taiwan Says Death Toll is 24K
Researchers in Hong Kong also claim to have discovered a vaccine but admitted that its development could take more than a year.
Be it as it may, Taiwanese media reported on Wednesday that the actual number of people infected and killed by the coronavirus is much larger than official Chinese data suggests.
According to Taiwan News, Tencent allegedly accidentally leaked the real numbers over the weekend as its Epidemic Situation Tracker showed that 154,023 people contracted the disease with 24,589 dying from it. The data was reportedly only briefly shown on the website and was then changed to figures provided by the Chinese government which, at the time, indicated 14,446 people were infected and 304 killed by the virus.