Britain Will Be First To Infect Healthy Volunteers With COVID-19 For Research

The world’s first COVID-19 human challenge is about to start.

Britain will infect 2,500 healthy volunteers with coronavirus to study how the infection behaves in the body — specifically the amount it takes before a person develops Covid-19, the Sun reported.

The government has budgeted $45 million for the research, which is being conducted by Imperial College, the National Health Service’s Royal Free Hospital and pharmaceutical company hVIVO, a pioneer in viral human challenge models.

Human challenge studies aren’t used often because of the ethical questions raised about infecting healthy people.

The Brits, ages 18 to 30, will get a dose of an experimental nasal vaccine, then be infected. The project gets underway in January; scientists expect the first results in May. Read more…..