On 31 December 2019, WHO was informed of a cluster of cases of pneumonia of unknown cause detected in Wuhan City, Hubei Province of China. Chinese authorities identified the SARS-CoV-2 as the causative virus on 7 January 2020, and the disease was named coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) by WHO on 11 February 2020. As part of WHO’s response to the outbreak, a Research and Development (R&D) Blueprint has been activated to accelerate the development of diagnostics, vaccines and therapeutics for this novel coronavirus.

Under WHO’s coordination, a group of experts with diverse backgrounds is working towards the development of vaccines against COVID-19.

The group makes a call to everyone to follow recommendations to prevent the transmission of the COVID-19 virus and protect the health of individuals. The group also thanks everyone for putting their trust in the scientific community.

Declaration

We are scientists, physicians, funders and manufacturers who have come together as part of an international collaboration, coordinated by the World Health Organization (WHO), to help speed the availability of a vaccine against COVID-19. While a vaccine for general use takes time to develop, a vaccine may ultimately be instrumental in controlling this worldwide pandemic. In the interim, we applaud the implementation of community intervention measures that reduce spread of the virus and protect people, including vulnerable populations, and pledge to use the time gained by the widespread adoption of such measures to develop a vaccine as rapidly as possible. We will continue efforts to strengthen the unprecedented worldwide collaboration, cooperation and sharing of data already underway. We believe these efforts will help reduce inefficiencies and duplication of effort, and we will work tenaciously to increase the likelihood that one or more safe and effective vaccines will soon be made available to all.

Signatories in alphabetical order     

• Randy A. Albrecht, Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai, USA
• Mohamad Assoum, Mercy Global Health              
• Luigi Aurisicchio, on behalf of Takis Biotech, Italy
• Dan Barouch, Center for Virology and Vaccine Research, USA
• Trevor Brasel, The University of Texas Medical Branch (UTMB), USA        
• Jennifer L Bath, ImmunoPrecise Antibodies, Canada
• Sina Bavari, Edge BioInnovation Consulting and Management, USA
• Maria Elena Bottazzi, Baylor College of Medicine, Houston, USA
• Gerhard Beck, Austrian Medicines and Medical Devices, Austria
• Tom Brady, Flow Pharma Inc, USA           
• Kate Broderick, Inovio, USA
• Will Brown, Altimmune Inc, USA
• Scot Bryson, Orbital Farm, Canada
• Ricardo Carrión, Texas Biomedical Research Institute, USA
• Miles Carroll, Public Health England, UK
• Keith Chappell, University of Queensland, Australia         
• Daniel S. Chertow, National Institutes of Health, U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, USA
• Sandra Cordo, Universidad de Buenos Aires, Argentina
• Wian de Jongh, on behalf of the Prevent n-CoV consortium (AdaptVac, ExpreS2ion, Copenhagen University, Leiden University Medical Centre, Wageningen University and Tubingen University)
• Natalie Dean, University of Florida, USA
• Rafael Delgado, Hospital Universitario 12 de Octubre, Spain
• Dimiter Dimitrov              
• David A. Dodd, GeoVax, Inc., USA            
• Paul Duprex, Center for Vaccine Research, University of Pittsburgh, USA
• Luis Enjuanes; Centro Nacional Biotecnología, Spain
• Jeremy Farrar, Josie Golding, Charlie Weller, on behalf of Wellcome Trust, UK
• Mark Feinberg, Swati Gupta and Ripley Ballou, on behalf of IAVI, USA
• Antonella Folgori, on behalf of ReiThera, Italy
• Thomas Friedrich, University of Wisconsin, School of Veterinary Medicine, USA
• Simon Funnel, Public Health England, UK
• Luc Gagnon, Nexelis, Canada
• Adolfo Garcia-Sastre, Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai, USA
• Vipin Garg, Altimmune Inc., USA
• Volker Gerdts, on behalf of VIDO-Intervac, University of Saskatchewan, Canada
• Nora Gerhards, Wageningen Bioveterinary Research, The Netherlands   
• Christiane Gerke, Head of Vaccine Programs/Head of Vaccine Innovation Development, Institut Pasteur, France
• Carlo Giaquinto, Department of Women and Child Health, University of Padova, Italy       
• Prakash Ghimire, Tribhuvan University, Nepal    
• Nikolaj Gilbert, Program for Appropriate Technology in Health (PATH), USA
• Sarah Gilbert, University of Oxford, UK
• Marion F. Gruber, Food and Drug Administration, U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, USA
• Farshad Guirakhoo, GeoVax Inc, USA
• Bart L Haagmans, Erasmus Medical Center, The Netherlands                       
• M. Elizabeth Halloran, Center for Inference and Dynamics of Infectious Diseases, Fred Hutchinson Cancer Research Center, and University of Washington, USA
• Scott Harris, Altimmune Inc, USA
• Hideki Hasegawa, National Institute of Infectious Diseases, Japan             
• Richard Hatchett, on behalf of the Coalition for Epidemic Preparedness Innovations (CEPI), Norway
• James Hayward, Applied DNA Sciences, USA
• Sheri Ann Hild                   
• Peter Hotez, Baylor College of Medicine, USA     
• Youngmee Jee, Seoul National University, College of Medicine, Republic of Korea
• Charu Kaushic, Institute of Infection and Immunity, Canadian Institutes of Health Research (CHIR), Government of Canada
• Alyson A. Kelvin, Dalhousie University, Canada
• Larry D. Kerr, Office of Global Affairs, U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, USA
• Bernard Kerscher, PEI, Germany
• Jae-Ouk Kim, International Vaccine Institute, Republic of Korea
• Seungtaek Kim, Institut Pasteur Korea, Republic of Korea
• Jason Kindrachuk, University of Manitoba, Canada
• Otfried Kistner, Senior Consultant and Independent Vaccine Expert, Austria
• Gary Kobinger, Université Laval, Canada
• Marion Koopmans, Viroscience Department, Erasmus Medical Centre, The Netherlands 
• Philip R. Krause, Food and Drug Administration, U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, USA
• Greg Kulnis, Nexelis, Canada
• Paul Henri Lambert, Centre of Vaccinology, University of Geneva, Switzerland
• Nathalie Landry, Medicago Inc., Canada
• Roger Le Grand, Inserm-CEA-Université Paris Saclay, France
• Robin Levis, Food and Drug Administration, U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, USA
• Mark G Lewis, Bioqual Inc, USA
• Joshua Liang, Clover Biopharmaceuticals, China
• Jinzhong Lin, on behalf of Fudan University, China
• Ira Longini, University of Florida, USA     
• Shabir Madhi, University of the Witwatersrand, Johannesburg, South Africa
• Jessica E. Manning, National Institutes of Health, U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, USA
• Peter Marks, Director, on behalf of Food and Drug Administration/Center for Biologics Evaluation and Research 
• Hilary D. Marston, National Institutes of Health, U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, USA
• Federico Martinón-Torres, Hospital Clínico Universitario de Santiago de Compostela, Spain
• Sebastian Maurer-Stroh, on behalf of the GISAID Initiative
• John W. Mellors, University of Pittsburgh School of Medicine, USA
• Ali Mirazimi, Department of Laboratory medicin, Karolinska institutet, Sweden
• Kayvon Modjarrad, Walter Reed Army Institute of Research, USA              
• Stefan O. Mueller, CureVac, Germany
• Vincent J. Munster, National Institutes of Health, U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, USA
• César Muñoz-Fontela, Bernhard-Nocht-Institute for Tropical Medicine, Germany
• Aysegul Nalca, U.S. Army Medical Research Institute of Infectious Diseases (USAMRIID), USA
• José Manuel Ochoa, Altimmune Inc., USA             
• Dave O’Connor, University of Wisconsin-Madison, USA
• Lidia Oostvogels, CureVac, Germany
• Nisreen M. A. Okba, Erasmus Medical Center, The Netherlands
• L. Jean Patterson, National Institutes of Health, U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, USA
• Joe Payne, on behalf of Arcturus Therapeutics
• Jonathan Pearce, on behalf of the UK Research and Innovation (UKRI) and the Medical Research Council (MRC), UK
• Stanley Perlman, University of Iowa, USA
• Margaret Louise Pitt, WRAIR/ U.S. Army Medical Research Institute of Infectious Diseases (USAMRIID), USA
• Anuradha Poonepalli, Health Products Regulation Group, Health Sciences Authority, Singapore
• Dieter Pullirsch, Austrian Medicines and Medical Devices Agency, Austria
• Damian Purcell, Doherty Institute, Australia
• Chuan Qin, Institute of Laboratory Animal Sciences (ILAS), CAMS & PUMC, China
• Angela Rasmussen, Columbia University Mailman School of Public Health, USA
• Scott Roberts, Altimmune Inc., USA
• Estefania Rodriguez, Bernhard Nocht Institute for Tropical Medicine, Germany   
• Ted M Ross, Center for Vaccines and Immunology, University of Georgia, USA
• Chad J Roy, Tulane National Primate Research Center and Tulane School of Medicine, USA
• Reid Rubsamen, Flow Pharma Inc, USA
• Anna Laura Salvati, Italy
• Andrew Satz, EVQLV Inc, USA
• Hanneke Schuitemaker and Johan Van Hoof, on behalf of Janssen Pharmaceuticals Companies of Johnson & Johnson, USA
• Robert Shattock, Imperial College, UK
• John Shriver, Sanofi, USA
• Gale Smith, Novavax Inc. USA
• Peter Smith, London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine, UK
• Isabel Sola, Centro Nacional Biotecnología, Spain
• James Southern, Adviser to South African Health Products Regulatory Authority 
• Jonathan M Spergel, Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia, Perelman School of Medicine at University of Pennsylvania, USA      
• Sybil Tasker, Codagenix Inc, USA
• Chien-Te Kent Tseng, University of Texas Medical Branch, Galveston, Texas, USA
• U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, USA, Assistant Secretary for Preparedness and Response/Biodefense Advanced Research and Development Authority
• U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, USA, Centers for Disease Control and Prevention
• Jean Marie Vianney Habarugira, on behalf of the European & Developing Countries Clinical Trials Partnership (EDCTP)                               
• Veronika von Messling, on behalf of German Federal Ministry of Education and Research, Germany
• Tony T. Wang, Food and Drug Administration, U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, USA
• Jeffrey Wolf, Heat Biologics Inc, USA       
• Ningshao Xia, Xiamen University of China, China
• Yingjie Xu, on behalf of Shanghai Jiaotong University, China
• Paul R Young, University of Queensland, Australia
• Hang Yu, on behalf of Shanghai RNACure, China
• Xuefeng Yu, CanSino Biologics, China
• Tal Zaks, on behalf of Moderna, USA
• Peter Daszak, President, EcoHealth Alliance, New York, USA

Official link

WHO Director-General’s opening remarks at the media briefing on COVID-19 – 13 April 2020

A live repository and dash-board for COVID-19 in Nepal

Interim Clinical Guidance for Care of Patients with COVID-19 in Health Care Settings