The trial process of India's first coronavirus vaccine -- Covishield -- is to be completed in next 58 days and it will be commercialised in 73 days, a top official at the Serum Institute of India said.

Em 15 de agosto, o órgão americano Food and Drug Administration (FDA) emitiu uma autorização de uso de emergência à Yale School of Public Health para a utilização do teste diagnóstico SalivaDirect COVID-19, um novo tipo de teste para detecção do vírus SARS-CoV-2 na saliva, o que poderia reduzir os custos e o tempo para processar os resultados.

Serum Institute of India (SII) has announced that it has entered into a new partnership with Gavi, the Vaccine Alliance and the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation to accelerate the manufacture and delivery of upto 100 million doses of COVID-19 vaccines for India and low- and middle-income countries (LMICs).

The Therapeutic Goods Administration (TGA), Division of the Australian Department of Health, has granted provisional approval to remdesivir ("Veklury", Gilead Sciences Pty Ltd) as the first treatment option for COVID-19. It has received provisional approval for use in adults and adolescent patients with severe COVID-19 symptoms who have been hospitalised.

Volunteers in Brazil have begun receiving a trial vaccine against COVID-19, in Latin America’s first phase 3 COVID-19 clinical trial. The trial officially began on Saturday 20th June and will enrol 5,000 volunteers across the country. Vaccinations will take place in Sao Paulo, Rio de Janeiro and a site in the Northeast of Brazil.

Politicians, government officials and pharma executives alike have been predicting a COVID-19 vaccine debut by year's end, but Merck CEO Kenneth Frazier doubts that's possible—and Merck has enough vaccine experience to know the obstacles ahead. Instead, those who are promising vaccines later this year could be hurting the overall fight against the pandemic, Frazier figures.