Coronavirus: Young and healthy? Don't expect a vaccine before 2022

Even if scientists create a safe and effective mass vaccine, producing enough for everyone will take years

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  People wait to be tested at the Goulburn Valley Health-Mcintosh Covid-19 testing centre in Shepparton, Victoria, Australia. The Covid-19 outbreak in Shepparton has been caused by a lorry driver infected in a shopping centre earlier in October. EPA

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  Auxiliary police officers wearing 'Smart Helmet', a portable thermo-scanner that can measure the temperature of passengers at a distance, patrol inside a commuter train, amid the coronavirus outbreak in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia. Reuters

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  A nurse prepares to administer a flu vaccination shot to a woman at a free clinic held at a local library in Lakewood, California. Medical experts are hoping the flu shot this year will help prevent a ‘twindemic’ - an epidemic of influenza paired with a second wave of Covid-19, which could lead to overwhelmed hospitals amid the coronavirus pandemic. AFP

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  Halloween pumpkins are displayed for photo opportunities at the 'Halloween at Descanso' event, which runs until the end of the month at Descanso Gardens in La Canada Flintridge, California, while observing social-distancing guidelines and enforcing face masks due to the ongoing coronavirus pandemic. Trick-or-Treating for Halloween in California this year has been "strongly discouraged" across the state due to the threat of coronavirus. AFP

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  Employees wear protective masks to serve customers at food counters in the PVR Icon cinema at the DLF Promenade Mall in New Delhi, India. Millions of filmgoers are excitedly waiting for cinemas to reopen this week after a seven-month pandemic-induced halt. Bloomberg

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  A filmgoer gets his temperature checked at the entrance of a cinema in the south Indian city of Bangalore, after movie halls reopened as the coronavirus-imposed lockdown eases further. AFP

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  Blind people and their families wait for food parcels during a food distribution organised by Gift of the Givers in Johannesburg CBD. Despite economic activity opening amid lockdown regulations to curb the spread of the coronavirus, the South Africa's economy is still negatively affected. AFP

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  Colourful face masks are on sale in a shop in the pedestrian area in the city of Dortmund, western Germany. In Dortmund, wearing a mask is mandatory in the pedestrian zone since October 13 as a measure to curb the spread of the coronavirus. AFP

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  Performers wearing face masks hold lanterns during the Royal Culture Festival at the Gyeongbok Palace in Seoul, South Korea. A month-long heritage festival that explores South Korea's royal palaces and culture started on October 10, with some of this year's events scheduled to be held online amid the coronavirus pandemic. AP Photo

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  A medic takes a swab from a woman as residents test for Covid-19 near a residential area in Qingdao in east China's Shandong province. AP Photo

The young and healthy may have to wait years before they can be vaccinated against Covid-19, a top World Health Organisation official has said.

WHO chief scientist Soumya Swaminathan's comments show the pandemic's effects may last well beyond a vaccine becoming available and measures such as travel restrictions could last years.

There are dozens of vaccines in clinical trials in many countries and hopes are rising for inoculation to begin this year, but Ms Swaminathan said mass shots were unlikely.

Even if a successful vaccine that is safe and effective were approved, the task of making billions of doses is colossal.

"Most people agree, [it should start] with healthcare workers and frontline workers, but even there you need to define which of them are at highest risk, and then the elderly and so on," Ms Swaminathan said.

"A healthy young person might have to wait until 2022."

But even producing a vaccine is proving challenging.

Two experiments, from Johnson & Johnson and AstraZeneca's US trial, have been paused after safety concerns this week, in a setback for the global effort.

But equally, letting the infection spread and hoping to achieve “herd immunity” was unethical and would lead to unnecessary deaths, Ms Swaminathan said.

"People talk about herd immunity," she said. "We should only talk about it in the context of a vaccine.

"You need to vaccinate at least 70 per cent of people to really break transmission."

And the world must not be complacent because the death rate was decreasing. As cases continue to rise, the number of dead will follow.

New cases are hitting 100,000 daily in Europe. Nearly 20,000 infections were reported in Britain, while Italy, Switzerland and Russia were among the nations with record case numbers.

Iran has had three days of record infections and India is on course to have the world’s worst death toll.

While deaths globally have fallen to about 5,000 a day from April's peak of more than 7,500, Ms Swaminathan said, cases are rising in intensive care units.

"Mortality increases always lag behind increasing cases by a couple of weeks," she said at a WHO social media event. "We shouldn't be complacent that death rates are coming down."

More than 39 million people have been reported infected globally and 1.1 million have died.

– with reporting by agencies