Coronavirus is accelerating around the world but there are still no drugs that can kill the virus or vaccines that can protect against it.
So the question is, how far are we from these life-saving medicines? When will there be a coronavirus vaccine?
Well ,the research is happening at breakneck speed.
There are more than 20 vaccines in development. One has begun human trials after unusually skipping any animal research to test either the safety or the effectiveness of the vaccine.
Other scientists are at the animal research stage and hope to get the results of human trials later in the year.
China has stepped up the process to finalise vaccines to counter COVID-19 after Kaiser Permanente research facility in Seattle and Washington stole the march and began human trials.
Currently, there are no effective drugs for the disease, although several candidate drugs are in clinical trials.
The first phase clinical trial for the vaccine, conducted in Wuhan, aims to evaluate the safety and tolerance for the vaccine in healthy adults between 18 and 60 years old.
A total of 108 volunteers had completed inoculation as of Friday, and are under medical observation, the China Daily reported. But experts have said that development of a drug/vaccine would definitely take at least a year at the earliest.
The novel coronavirus has spread across the world, with the death toll crossing 35,000 worldwide. Italy, Spain and the United States have surpassed the number of cases in China, where the disease first emerged in December in Wuhan