What Was the Timeline for the Development of the Pfizer and Moderna Vaccines?

Imagine if you will that someone had the idea to invent “the wheel.” There was some R&D involved in the task and it was found that a round wheel worked better than a square one. Once you had the basic concept established, you could try the wheel out on different conveyances, even those not yet fully adopted by others. If it works on a cart, why won’t it work on a chariot? What if we had four wheels and we called it a wagon? What if we harnessed a donkey or horse to the wagon instead of pulling it by hand. What if we bred the donkey with a horse and called it a mule? This is how progress is made.

So it was with the mRNA molecule, the basis for the COVID-19 vaccines that Moderna and Pfizer developed. The techniques used to make the coronavirus vaccines go back to the 1970s.

One of the reasons people put forth for not getting vaccinated is that the vaccines were developed too quickly to be valid and there is too much unknown about the process for it to be safe. Just having had this conversation with a neighbor, I know that there are people who don’t trust the lifesaving vaccines that are free to anyone living in the United States. I guess you would call it a shame.

Should you be in the camp described above or know someone who is, or run into people, your own relatives for instance, who are vaccine hesitant due the rapidity of the vaccine development, I recommend you listen to this New York Times (which some people don’t trust either) The Daily podcast: “The Unlikely Pioneer Behind mRNA Vaccines.”

The show’s description is below:

“When she was at graduate school in the 1970s, Dr. Katalin Kariko learned about something that would become a career-defining obsession: mRNA. She believed in the potential of the molecule, but for decades ran up against institutional roadblocks. Then, the coronavirus hit and her obsession would help shield millions from a once-in-a-century pandemic. Today, a conversation with Dr. Kariko about her journey.”

40-plus years of research — I would not say it was rushed!