LONDON (Reuters) – Britain became the first country in the world on Wednesday to allow volunteers to be exposed to the COVID-19 virus to advance pandemic medical research.
The process, which will begin within a month, will see up to 90 healthy volunteers aged 18-30 exposed to COVID-19 in a safe and controlled environment to increase understanding of how the virus affects humans, said the government.
To make the process as safe as possible, the version of the virus circulating in England from March 2020 will be used rather than one of the new variants.
The study will initially seek to determine the smallest amount of virus needed to cause the infection, he said. Volunteers may be given vaccine candidates before they are exposed to the virus.
Volunteers will be compensated for participation.
British Business Secretary Kwasi Kwarteng said the study would help find the best and most effective vaccines for long-term use.
These human challenge studies will take place here in the UK and will help accelerate scientists’ knowledge of how coronavirus affects humans and could eventually lead to the rapid development of vaccines, he said.
The government’s vaccine task force, Imperial College London, the Royal Free London NHS Foundation Trust and the clinical company hVIVO, which pioneered human viral challenge models, are working on this study.
Reported by Paul Sandle, edited by Sarah Young and Christian Schmollinger