• The Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine has been awarded to two scientists who developed the principle that made the first COVID-19 vaccines possible.
• This principle uses mRNA to devise a system in which vaccines can be quickly produced to fight against virtually any virus.
• COVID-19 has killed nearly 7 million people worldwide.

The Nobel Prize winners for 2023 are being announced, and today the esteemed Prize in Physiology or Medicine was awarded to a pair of scientists who discovered the technology that enabled the creation of mRNA vaccines against COVID-19.

Hungarian Katalin Karikó and American Drew Weissman are now Nobel Laureates after being informed of their win this morning over the phone. According to the BBC both were said to be “overwhelmed.”

Officially, the Nobel Prize was awarded “for their discoveries concerning nucleoside base modifications that enabled the development of effective mRNA vaccines against COVID-19.”

Both scientists are being awarded for the breakthrough of developing a technology that can rapidly develop a vaccine against almost everything through a series of coded genetic instructions through mRNA. This principle is what allowed the COVID-19 vaccines to be developed so quickly compared to other jabs in the past.

The award now places the discovery and therefore creation of the COVID-19 vaccine on the same lofty ground as the discovery of tumour-inducing viruses, the first antibiotic effective against tuberculosis, the revelation that pesticide DDT was poisonous to humans and the discovery of penicillin.

“The laureates contributed to the unprecedented rate of vaccine development during one of the greatest threats to human health in modern times,” said the Nobel Prize committee.

SARS-CoV-2, otherwise known as COVID-19 or the novel coronavirus killed nearly 7 million people across the globe as of September 2023, according to the World Health Organisation. In South Africa, 102 596 individuals succumbed to the disease.

Since 2019 there have been 770 million confirmed cases of the virus, which is still mutating and spreading around the world.

Vaccine doses administered now count more than 13 million. Although highly controversial due to their politicised nature, vaccines from manufacturers like Moderna and Pfizer have been shown to be highly effective in stopping COVID mortality.

However, concerns over rare serious side effects have led to hesitance in South Africa and other parts of the world. Another concern is the safety of the vaccines as they were created and manufactured in record time.

The European Medicines Agency reported that 11 448 people have died in the EU after taking COVID-19 vaccines. In comparison, 2.2 million people have died of the virus itself in the same region.

In August, the latest COVID-19 variant to be discovered in South Africa was codenamed Eris, which has been shown to be less dangerous than previous strains.

[Image – Fusion Medical Animation on Unsplash]