In the past week, multiple vaccine candidates for COVID-19 have been approved for use in countries around the world. In addition, preliminary clinical trial data about the successful performance of other candidates has also been released. While these announcements have caused great excitement, a certain amount of caution and perspective are needed to discern what this news actually means for potentially ending the worst global health pandemic in a century in sight.

Join us today at 2 PM ET (19 UT) for a discussion with vaccine and immunology experts, organized by the American Society for Microbiology (ASM). We'll answer questions about the approved vaccines, what the clinical trial results mean (and don't mean), and how the approval processes have worked. We'll also discuss what other vaccine candidates are in the pipeline, and whether the first to complete the clinical trials will actually be the most effective against this disease. Finally, we'll talk about what sort of timeline we should expect to return to normalcy, and what the process will be like for distributing and vaccinating the world's population. Ask us anything!

With us today are:

• Dr. Brianne R. Barker, Ph.D. (u/BioProfBarker)- Associate Professor of Biology, Drew University
• Dr. A. Oveta Fuller, Ph.D. (u/TrustMessenger)- Associate Professor, African Studies Center International Institute; Microbiology and Immunology Department, University of Michigan Medical School
• Dr. Vineet D. Menachery, Ph.D. (u/VineetMenachery)- Assistant Professor, Department of Microbiology and Immunology, University of Texas Medical Branch, Galveston, Texas

Links:

• https://asm.org/Articles/2020/December/COVID-19-Vaccine-FAQs
• https://asm.org/COVID/COVID-19-Research-Registry/Home
• https://asm.org/Podcasts/TWiV/Episodes/We-put-COVID-19-papers-through-a-sieve-TWiV-688
• https://www.clickondetroit.com/all-about-ann-arbor/2020/12/11/why-a-university-of-michigan-professor-voted-no-on-pfizers-covid-vaccine/

EDIT: We've signed off for the day! Thanks for your questions!