COVID-19: An Overview of Current progress and prospects in the frantic race to develop upcoming safe and effective SARS-CoV-2 vaccine Candidates

Coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) is an emerging infectious disease caused by severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus-2 (SARS-CoV-2). It quickly spread around the world after its first emergence in Wuhan in December 2019 to become a global pandemic with millions of infections worldwide. As of 1 November 2020, nearly 46 million cases have been reported globally and 1.2 million patients succumbed to the viral disease. Due to the lack of efficient and specific therapeutic and prophylactic options available and the need to contain the epidemic, and its economic, political, cultural, demographic and societal consequences, there is a strong consensus globally only the development of a safe and effective vaccine against COVID-19 is the best way to control and ultimately end the pandemic. Faced with the urgency imposed by the speed of expansion of covid-19, scientists are led to launch themselves into a race against the clock to produce a safe and effective coronavirus vaccine by next year. Once the vaccine has been developed, strong international coordination and cooperation between all stakeholders in the vaccine productionprocess will be needed to ensure equitable availability of the vaccine to the global population