♪ (show opening techno music) ♪
♪ ♪
♪ (upbeat music) ♪ (ambulance siren)
David suzuki: It was the challenge of a lifetime.
As the coronavirus raged around the world,
Scientists mobilized to fight back,
With a vaccine.
Dr. Heeney: So the gloves are off, and the race is on.
Suzuki: In canada, dr. Alyson kelvin
Will leave her family to work on a vaccine.
She won't see them for five months.
Dr. Kelvin: Despite the sacrifices
I would have felt useless being at home.
Suzuki: In germany, professor ugur sahin
And his wife, dr. Ozlem tureci run biontech.
Within a year, the whole world will know that name.
In china, dr. Xuefeng yu
Is backed by the military.
In just 50 days,
His company will be winning the race.
And in the u.K., dr. Jonathan heeney
Is chasing the holy grail,
A vaccine that protects against multiple coronaviruses.
Dr. Heeney: Why wait again for another disaster?
Suzuki: Hundreds of teams join the battle.
But to defeat the coronavirus
More than just one must succeed.
Prof. Sahin: We have to provide
Almost ten billion doses.
Suzuki: Never in history,
Has so much vaccine been needed so urgently,
Enough for everyone on the planet.
Dr. Kelvin: That was unprecedented.
(ambulance siren)
Suzuki: From the streets of brazil,
To the bat caves of thailand,
From the biohazard labs of china,
To the high security vaccine facilities of germany,
The inside story of the race
To save everyone on earth.
♪ (soft dramatic music) ♪
♪
♪ (upbeat dramatic music) ♪
♪ ♪
It's just days since news of the outbreak in wuhan.
But dr. Alyson kelvin has already made a dramatic move.
Jeremy (video call): ...Make a strawberry rhubarb pie.
Suzuki: A week ago, she left her husband
And two young children, to fly
4,000 kilometres from halifax
To a top security lab in saskatoon.
♪
This is the headquarters of vido-intervac.
It's home to one of the biggest
Bio-containment labs in the world.
A bunker built in the middle of the canadian prairies.
♪
Everyday, alyson goes through a painstaking ritual,
This is one of the few places in canada
Capable of handling a virus
Like the one infecting people in wuhan.
Dr. Kelvin: I am really scared of this.
This is in china, but,
In a month, in two months,
Our whole world is going to change.
I can't sit and watch and do nothing
When I know I have the expertise.
If I'm not doing this work,
I'm not contributing.
And the only place to do that was here.
Start prepping the processing tubes.
Co-worker: I can do that. Dr. Kelvin: Okay.
Suzuki: Alyson is already helping to develop a vaccine.
Everyone here, including team leader dr. Volker gerdts,
Is frightened by the news out of china.
Dr. Gerdts: We're hearing that there's some cases in wuhan
We're hearing that there's
More and more patients that are being hospitalized.
So, at this point of time, we can't predict,
I think we need to prepare for the worst case
And find a solution for this as quickly as possible.
♪ (upbeat dramatic music) ♪
News anchor: China has identified the cause
Of the mysterious pneumonia outbreak in wuhan city.
Suzuki: In an amazing feat, researchers map the
Genetic blueprint of the virus in just 40 hours,
Confirming what everyone fears.
News anchor: -- It's from the same family that caused
The deadly sars epidemic 17 years ago.
Suzuki: It's an extraordinary breakthrough,
But scientists still face a grim challenge.
This new coronavirus has a frightening mutation.
You can transmit it without having a single symptom.
It's called sars cov-2.
Few people are taking notice.
But scientists fear,
It's already spreading around the world.
♪ (dramatic music) ♪
♪
At a little known company called biontech,
Two other researchers are also racing to create a vaccine.
Prof. Sahin: We used already the weekend to download
The sequences and to start to design
The first vaccine candidates.
Suzuki: Professor ugur sahin and his wife dr. Ozlem tureci,
Have spent 20 years perfecting
A breakthrough technology to fight cancer.
It's called an rna vaccine.
Now, they realize this same technology
Could be used to confront the coronavirus.
Prof. Sahin: We have a special situation here.
It is the worst pandemic in the last, at least 50 years,
Maybe in the last 100 years,
And we have in the meantime
The ability to react fast,
We have the technologies available.
Suzuki: But it's a huge risk.
Biontech may be sophisticated and high tech,
But it has never brought a vaccine to market.
Their gamble could destroy everything
Ugur and ozlem have achieved.
Prof. Sahin: Yeah, it is a big risk,
But we felt obligation that we need to do something.
We need to fight, to start to fight this virus
And we need to develop a vaccine
And we don't have time to waste.
Suzuki: Biontech call their quest project light speed,
And start working around the clock
To design a vaccine.
♪ (dramatic music) ♪
Tv news host: The epicenter of china's killer virus
Is tonight in lockdown.
The city closing its transport network.
♪ (dramatic music) ♪
17 people are now confirmed dead,
While a new case has turned up in hong kong.
Suzuki: Authorities lockdown the entire city.
A quarantine is imposed on nine million people,
Sometimes by force.
♪ (dramatic music) ♪ (grunting/shouting)
♪ ♪
A thousand kilometres to the north of wuhan,
At the headquarters of cansino,
They're already responding to the lockdown.
♪ ♪
It's the first day of the chinese new year.
But everyone's been called back.
(speaking foreign language)
Suzuki: Cansino is in an
Extraordinary position to move quickly.
They've got the backing of the chinese military.
That makes dr. Xufeng yu and his company
One of the favourites to win the race to create a vaccine.
Dr. Yu: We start working with our collaborators.
That allow us to develop quickly
For a coronavirus vaccine.
Suzuki: Dr. Yu has another advantage.
Every vaccine must go through human trials.
Phase I tests safety,
Phase 2 determines immune response,
And phase 3 discovers whether the vaccine is effective.
Cansino can finish trials faster
Than almost any other team
For one reason: Wuhan.
♪ (dramatic music) ♪ (ambulance sirens)
Wuhan is the perfect place to test a vaccine.
There are thousands of volunteers
And a virus that's out of control.
But only the military have complete access to the city,
And with them, cansino.
Dr. Yu: Wuhan is the epicenter.
There, we can quickly move
The clinical trials from phase 1
All the way to phase 3.
♪ (dramatic music) ♪
Tv news host: Italy is facing its most difficult challenge
Since the second world war.
Suzuki: The virus has escaped china
And is now ravaging europe.
Reporter: Italy has passed another grim milestone
Recording 793 deaths in a single day.
♪ (dramatic music) ♪
Suzuki: The crisis is so intense,
Scientists are working together
In an unprecedented way.
Roy: Alyson, do you have any experience with it or no?
Dr. Kelvin: Yeah, no, I would use it--
Suzuki: Dr. Alyson kelvin is embedded with vido-intervac.
But she's also working with two other canadian teams.
Dr. Kelvin: Collaborations have been
Like nothing we've seen before.
If we all did this individually,
Then we wouldn't get the data for years.
Prof. Sahin: There is no historical evidence that,
That a vaccine against a new pathogen
Can be developed in less than twelve months.
This challenge can only be addressed
If we work together on a global, global way.
♪
Suzuki: In many ways, alyson has trained for this role
Her entire life.
Her father, david, is an infectious disease scientist.
He taught her to walk, while he was at conferences.
And he instilled the basics from the beginning.
Dr. Kelvin: I had to walk around saying that
Dna and rna are the building blocks of life.
Suzuki: Over her career, alyson has chased viruses,
Worked on the team that responded to sars in 2003,
And the influenza epidemic in 2009.
Dr. Kelvin: Everything that I've done really set me up
To be ready for this outbreak.
♪ (dramatic music) ♪
♪
Suzuki: Dr. Jonathan heeney is also rushing
To design a vaccine.
But he's unique.
Dr. Heeney: Hey ernest, how are things looking?
Suzuki: While everyone is concentrating
On the coronavirus,
He's focused on where it came from.
Dr. Heeney: We are probably dealing with hundreds,
If not thousands of different coronaviruses
That have the propensity to spill over into humans.
(sound of a bat colony flying)
Suzuki: Jonathan is a canadian who trained as a veterinarian.
He's an expert on lethal coronaviruses
That come from a single source.
Dr. Heeney: It's the ones in bats that are particularly
Virulent for humans, meaning that they
Can cause severe disease.
Suzuki: It's why he believes that we have to prepare now
For the next coronavirus.
♪ (dramatic music) ♪
♪ ♪
Dr. Heeney: So if we could
Actually broaden that protection
Across the whole beta coronavirus family,
Then we can get a vaccine, not just protects
From this virus and this pandemic,
But pandemics that come from this sub-family
Of coronaviruses in the future.
That's really the holy grail that we're chasing right now.
I don't know if it's possible to talk to benedict today but--
Suzuki: But jonathan can't make a pan-coronavirus
Vaccine on his own.
He needs genetic sequences,
Hundreds of them,
Coronaviruses carried by bats.
And for those, he's relying on an extraordinary scientist
On the other side of the planet.
♪ (soft dramatic music) ♪
♪
For buddhists, these caves are sacred.
♪
For dr. Supaporn washarapluesadee
They're critical for another reason.
(speaking foreign language)
♪ (soft dramatic music) ♪
Suzuki: The temple sits on top of a limestone cave,
That's home to more than two and-a-half million bats.
♪ (soft dramatic music) ♪
♪
Dr. Supaporn and her team
Are here to collect coronaviruses,
And help jonathan heeney make his vaccine.
♪
♪ (dramatic music) ♪
(sound of bat colony flying) ♪
The bats are untangled carefully.
A single bite or scratch from the wrong one
Could transmit a virus with the power to kill.
♪
Dr. Supaporn identifies every virus collected.
She shares any new ones
With researchers around the world.
♪
This is the genetic gold
That jonathan heeney is searching for.
♪
♪ (show theme music) ♪
♪ (dramatic music) ♪
♪
Suzuki: Every day, dr. Jonathan heeney
Assesses the new coronavirus sequences
Discovered by dr. Supaporn
And other scientists around the world.
Dr. Heeney: And these are the 17 different alignments.
Suzuki: He quickly identifies the ones for his vaccine.
Each will protect us from a different coronavirus,
Should they one day jump from bats to humans.
Now, the hard work of designing begins.
Tv news host: The coronavirus outbreak
Is officially declared a pandemic.
Suzuki: Scientists have understood the increasing
Threat of the virus for nearly two months.
But the rest of the world is just catching up.
Tv news host: With 116 countries hit by the virus
The world health organization
Hit the alarm button.
Dr. Ghebreyesus: We have rung the alarm bell
Loud and clear.
♪ (dramatic music) ♪
♪
Suzuki: For the team at biontech,
The growing disaster is adding urgency
To project light speed.
Their rna vaccine is designed.
Now, they're testing 20 different versions in their lab
To discover the best.
♪
A traditional vaccine contains a weakened piece of the live virus
Or the inactivated virus itself.
These trick our body into producing antibodies
And t cells to protect us.
Rna vaccines are much more sophisticated.
They deliver a copy of the genetic code
Of the spike protein.
Our cells use this code
To manufacture harmless versions of the protein.
These trigger our immune system
To arm for an attack by the coronavirus.
But biontech faces a critical problem.
Prof. Sahin: This project is just too big to do it alone,
And we knew our competencies
That we can engineer
Almost perfect vaccine
But we also knew our limitations.
Suzuki: Finding a partner won't be easy.
There are more than 250 teams in the race,
Including some of the biggest
Pharmaceutical companies in the world.
But ugur and ozlem are the right scientists
At the right moment.
Prof. Sahin: We love science, we live science
And we want to use science,
To help people.
Suzuki: The couple started biontech
To develop rna
To create personalized cures for cancer.
Over the last 20 years,
They've refined the technology
And learned how to make a vaccine fast.
Prof. Sahin: Our goal was to develop a medicine which,
Which helps a single individual.
And it turned out that the same technology
Can provide medicines for mankind.
Suzuki: But all that potential is under threat.
If biontech can't find a partner quickly,
Project light speed is over.
♪ (dramatic music) ♪
♪ ♪
While biontech fights to stay in the race,
Vido-intervac is unexpectedly
Out among the frontrunners.
Part of the reason is dr. Alyson kelvin
And her unique expertise.
A new vaccine must first be tested on animals.
If it works, it goes on to phase I human trials.
Rats, mice and hamsters are used,
But ferrets are the gold standard.
The coronavirus makes them sick,
But it doesn't take their lives.
Alyson is a world expert on these animals.
Dr. Kelvin: Having a successful ferret model is
Incredibly important to
How we are evaluating vaccines.
Suzuki: Believing the coronavirus
Would sweep the globe,
Alyson assembled hundreds of ferrets.
Vido-intervac is one of the first teams in the world
To begin animal trials.
If their vaccine doesn't work here,
Vido's quest could be over.
♪
This group of ferrets was vaccinated weeks ago.
Then, they were injected with the live coronavirus.
Animal care specialists
Keep a constant eye on the ferrets,
Checking them every day.
♪ (soft dramatic music) ♪
♪
Dr. Kelvin: Another tube rack, please.
Suzuki: Alyson tests samples taken from the ferrets.
These samples are highly dangerous,
Because they contain the live virus.
Dr. Kelvin: Ok, I'm almost ready.
Suzuki: Her goal is to discover if the vido vaccine
Protected the ferrets from covid-19.
Dr. Darryl falzarano,
Gets the results.
Darryl falzarano: So I look at vaccine development
As a step-by-step process,
And every step along the way could be a "no."
So our results from our first ferret study were not a "no",
So that means we proceed to continue to work on this.
♪ (dramatic music) ♪
♪
Suzuki: At biontech, ozlem tureci and ugur sahin
Are still rushing to create a vaccine.
But the company urgently needs a partner,
They don't have the resources to continue on their own.
Weeks ago, they made a pitch
To one of the world's leading vaccine makers.
Now they have their answer.
Prof. Sahin: So today we have announced
Our collaboration with pfizer.
It is a fantastic partnership.
For us it was important
To partner with a company
Which brings in complimentary strengths.
That means being able to do
A phase three clinical trial
In a shortest possible time
And being able to manufacture the vaccine
With us, and ensure
That the vaccine is supplied worldwide.
♪ (dramatic music) ♪
♪
Suzuki: India declares a nation-wide lockdown.
1.3 billion people
Are ordered to go home and stay there.
♪
Worldwide, infections are out of control.
Nbc reporter: Global cases rising above 650,000
With more than 30,000 dead.
♪ (dramatic music) ♪
♪ ♪
Suzuki: At cansino, the rising death toll
Has motivated dr. Yu and his team to move fast.
After just 50 days, they're ready to test their vaccine
In phase I human trials.
Dr. Yu: We will be the first one,
To see how this vaccine works.
Suzuki: What makes the cansino vaccine unique
Is the delivery system.
It's an adenovirus that causes the common cold.
But cansino removes the genes that make it infectious,
And replaces them
With the genetic code of the spike protein.
Our cells then manufacture the protein,
Which primes our immune system for an attack.
Reaching human trials so quickly
Is an extraordinary feat
For a company that's just 12 years old.
Cansino is leading the race,
Because of dr. Yu.
♪
Twenty years ago, he left china and came to canada.
He worked in the vaccine industry
And made contacts with key scientific labs.
Now, he's turning this knowledge
Into a homegrown vaccine
That's leading the world.
Dr. Yu: I'm very confident, with our past experience
I think it will work.
(car engine idleing)
(doors clinking open)
Suzuki: But the first human trials in the world are on hold.
♪ (suspenseful music) ♪
Cansino is ready to conduct them
A thousand kilometres away in wuhan,
A city still under lockdown.
♪
But this shipment of the vaccine must get there
Before the phase I trials can start.
♪
The vaccine arrives at 4 in the morning.
Dr. Yu: It's a not easy journey
But they made it.
Suzuki: Cansino wastes no time giving the vaccine
To civilian and military volunteers.
They know, if these trials fail,
Their race is over.
♪ (upbeat dramatic music) ♪
♪ (show theme music) ♪
♪ (upbeat dramatic music) ♪
♪
- Have a great day. - Ok.
- Thanks so much!
- Bye! - Bye!
- Thanks! Thank you.
Suzuki: Months after arriving in saskatoon,
Dr. Alyson kelvin and her colleague maggie francis,
Are still living out of a suitcase.
And they're still working seven days a week.
Dr. Kelvin: So how did things go on the microscope last night?
Dr. Maggie francis: Ah, it was good.
Suzuki: Long hours, unexpected delays
And a mounting covid death toll
Are pushing everyone to the edge.
Dr. Gerdts: I think we all are, um,
Close to, um, um,
(chuckles)
We, we're doing fine.
We, we're doing fine here. It's, it's been,
You know, very, very busy six months for all of us,
And we can see that people are starting to
Show signs of, of the enormous workload
And stress right now.
Darryl falzarano: Perfect, let's go.
Suzuki: But for alyson kelvin, it's more than just the hours,
And the responsibility of saving lives.
♪ (slow dramatic music) ♪
♪
Dr. Kelvin: Oh, there you are.
Um, what did you guys do today?
Chloe: I made this.
Dr. Kelvin: Oh, nice, another squishy!
I have been talking to them every day,
And sometimes multiple times a day,
Sometimes for advice on
What to get a person's friend for their birthday
Or what ingredients to put
In the new cookie recipe.
I miss you.
Jeff: Miss you too.
Chloe: Love you.
Dr. Kelvin: Love you too, babies.
Jeff: Alright, we'll talk to you tomorrow, then?
Dr. Kelvin: Yeah!
Jeff: Alright, chloe: Bye!
Jeff: Have a good night!
Dr. Kelvin: Bye, sweeties!
Kids: Bye!
Dr. Kelvin: Despite the sacrifices
That I've made to come here,
I would have felt useless being at home.
It wouldn't have made sense to me to stay.
Although I miss my family.
Ya, you're going to make me cry.
(laughter)
Tv anchor lester holt: America now surpassing 100,000
Confirmed deaths from covid-19.
Suzuki: Despite their commitment,
Scientists are still losing the war against the coronavirus.
World-wide it seems unstoppable,
With cases reaching five million.
♪ (dramatic music) ♪
Everywhere, people are waiting.
Hoping for a vaccine.
♪ (dramatic music) ♪
♪ ♪
It's cansino that provides the breakthrough.
♪
They're the first team in the world
To publish peer-reviewed results
From their phase I human trials.
But their vaccine isn't performing as well
As everyone hoped.
The medium level dose
Only protected half the volunteers.
While cansino drops the highest dose,
Because of side effects.
The issue is the cansino delivery system,
An adenovirus responsible for the common cold.
Because we've all had a cold,
Our immune system attacks the adenoviruses
As soon as they enter our body.
Many are neutralized
And blocked from delivering the vaccine.
♪ (dramatic music) ♪
♪ ♪
While other teams are moving fast,
In germany, ugur sahin is moving faster.
To avoid delays, biontech combined
Their phase 1 and 2 human trials.
Prof. Sahin: Everyone understood that we don't have time to lose.
So that means working on the weekends,
Even people coming in the night,
So that in the next morning,
The team members could continue with the research.
Suzuki: In just over 12 weeks,
Ugur sahin and his partners at pfizer,
Receive their first phase 1 and 2 results.
Prof. Sahin: So we just got the immune response data
For our vaccine and it's great to see
That we have strong neutralizing anti-body responses
And we see also t-cell responses,
Which means that we can continue to go.
♪ (fast-paced music) ♪
♪ ♪
Suzuki: After poor results in phase 1 human trials,
Cansino is back in the race.
Other teams have already announced their phase 2 results.
Dr. Yu now has his own numbers.
Dr. Yu: The results is quite exciting.
All this data suggest
That we might have a vaccine candidate
Become a true vaccine,
In the near future.
Suzuki: But dr. Yu faces an unexpected setback.
There are no longer enough infections in china
To do his phase 3 trials here.
So he has to find a new location.
And that will take time,
Ending cansino's quest to be first
To create a vaccine.
Tv news host: U.S. Trends are deeply troubling.
On Friday a new record,
With more than 79,000 cases in one day.
Er doctor: I'm very scared that if this doesn't stop soon,
We're going to end up with a much bigger problem.
Suzuki: Infections in the united states hit six million,
The highest in the world.
But one country is close behind.
♪
Sao paulo, brazil
Now has the biggest cemeteries
In latin america.
(people crying and sobbing)
Tens of thousands of graves are dug
For an endless procession of funerals.
(ambulance siren sounding)
(speaking foreign language)
(ambulance siren sounding)
Suzuki: For rosangela tupinelli, and roseli maksoud,
Everyday is a deadly battle.
(ambulance siren sounding)
(speaking foreign language)
(ambulance siren sounding)
Suzuki: There are only four female
First responders in sao paulo.
Roseangela is an 11-year veteran.
(ambulance sirens sounding)
(speaking foreign language)
(ambulance sirens sounding) ♪
Suzuki: With covid-19 running rampant in brazil,
This is where biontech is doing their phase 3 human trials.
Ugur sahin: We have to go to places
Where the pandemic is active,
And many people are infected on a daily basis.
(speaking foreign language)
Suzuki: While cansino is re-tooling,
Ugur sahin and his partners at pfizer,
Are doing everything right.
(speaking foreign language)
Their phase 1 human trials
Tested the safety of their vaccine.
Phase 2 examined immune response.
♪
Now, here in brazil, phase 3 will reveal
Whether their vaccine actually works.
Biontech has recruited 44,000 volunteers.
Half will get the vaccine, half a placebo.
The number protected will reveal
The effectiveness of their vaccine.
(speaking foreign language)
When rosangela tupinelli heard about the trials,
She wanted to help.
(speaking foreign language)
♪ (soft dramatic music) ♪
(speaking foreign language)
Suzuki: Because of her high-risk job,
Roseangela is the perfect volunteer.
(speaking foreign language)
Biontech needs results fast.
Worldwide, more than 700,000 people have died.
(speaking foreign language)
Suzuki: Blood samples are on their way to labs in the u.S.
Vaccines will be approved,
If they're more than 50% effective.
Biontech must quickly discover if they can reach this mark.
Fail, and they're out of the race.
(speaking foreign language)
♪ ♪
♪ (show theme music) ♪
♪ (soft music) ♪
♪
Dr. Kelvin: So, just getting our stuff in.
Still a bit chaotic.
Suzuki: In canada, alyson kelvin has realized,
That she can't continue her quest to make a vaccine,
Without her family.
Today, they arrived in saskatoon.
It's been five months since alyson's seen them.
Dr. Kelvin: They got in the car
And drove across the country
To come and live here
Possibly for a year, possibly longer.
I always think of myself as a mother,
A mother scientist,
That's kind of my identity
And to take one of those away is,
Is killing me, it's awful.
So, I needed to have my kids
With me to complete my life.
(birds chirping)
Antonio guterres: There is now, a clear,
Real danger of mutations
Making the virus more transmissible,
More lethal and more resistant.
(ambulance siren)
Suzuki: Variants are appearing around the world,
More infectious and deadly
Than the original coronavirus.
(ambulance siren wailing)
(machine beeping)
(paramedic speaking foreign language)
But as these variants begin to take their toll,
The moment everyone has hoped for.
♪
News host: Good evening, it's the news
The world has been waiting for all year.
Dawna freisen: No vaccine has gone from the drawing board
To showing signs of promise
In such a short period of time.
Tv news host: Pharmaceutical giant pfizer
Claims its vaccine is 90% effective.
Dr. Albert bourla: The greatest medical advance
In the last 100 years.
(factory noise)
Prof. Sahin: The results are fantastic,
Much better than expected.
We have seen an efficacy
Over 90%, yeah?
This is dramatic.
Suzuki: Less then 10 months after launching
Operation lightspeed,
Ugur sahin and ozlem tureci,
Have their vaccine.
Ugur grab: It is a fantastic, relieving feeling--
Ozlem tureci: --And made us very happy.
Prof. Sahin: It shows that we can fight
And defeat the virus,
And shows that vaccines can control the disease.
Holt: Tonight, is it the beginning of the end
Of the pandemic? The first covid vaccinations
Administered in the u.S.
(people clapping)
Dawna freisen: On this Monday night, canada's first shots!
(people clapping)
Suzuki: In canada, britain and the united states,
Thousands finally receive the biontech vaccine.
Woman: We have been waiting for this for so long.
And I'm, I'm here now and I'm so thankful.
Woman: I'm excited. Reporter: Yeah, why?
Woman: Because I am the first one to have the vaccine.
Dr. Kevin smith: We turned the corner.
You know, I like to say this is the shot
That will be heard around the world.
Suzuki: But for this lifeline to succeed,
Billions of doses of vaccine are necessary.
To get them, many more teams must finish the race.
Prof. Sahin: We have a huge challenge.
We have to provide
Almost 10 billion doses
In the next 12 to 18 months,
And biontech-pfizer can't do that alone.
♪ (dramatic music) ♪
Suzuki: In china, cansino
Responds to ugur sahin's call.
Ten weeks after biontech,
They finish their phase 3 trials.
♪
Dr. Yu receives government approval,
And his company begins producing millions of doses.
Dr. Yu: All our efforts in the past year
Is really to wait to this day
And our vaccine can really be used to people
To protect them from infection.
♪ (dramatic music) ♪
Suzuki: In canada, vido-intervac also answers
The call for more vaccines
As they begin their phase 1 human trials.
Dr. Gerdts: There's many countries in the world right now
Where citizens don't even have access
To any of the vaccines, right? And so the second wave
Of these vaccines will provide
Access globally to some of these technologies
That currently doesn't exist.
♪ (dramatic music) ♪
♪ ♪
Suzuki: In the u.K., dr. Jonathan heeney
Is also pushing forward.
♪
Dr. Heeney: Vaccines will only work,
If we manage to vaccinate
The vast majority of the population,
Otherwise we can end up in this mess, all over again.
Suzuki: For the first time in more than a year,
Alyson kelvin is home on a Saturday.
Dr. Kelvin: Just when you think it's too much,
Add more.
Suzuki: Helping vido-intervac create a vaccine
To stop the coronavirus,
Has made her realize
What this battle is really about.
Dr. Kelvin: This virus hijacks our innate human need
For companionship, for love,
For friendship,
And that's how it's transmitting
Between one person to another.
So, I was happy to
Make sacrifices in my life.
I knew that the only way
We would be able to
Deal with this virus
Was through developing an effective vaccine.
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