Shot of Hope: Tracking the race for Covid vaccine the world is waiting for

The first of a two-part series tracks the making of vaccine that the world is waiting for

War and disease have marched arm in arm for centuries. As World War II raged in Europe, the US military recognised that infectious disease was as formidable an enemy as any they would encounter on the battlefield. The US set up the Influenza Vaccine Commission to protect its soldiers from a repeat of the Spanish flu more than two decades ago. 

Scientists took up the vaccine human trials on soldiers with war-time urgency. They completed the trials within a year, with full government backing, according to experts.

Could the Covid crisis do for the coronavirus vaccine what the war did for the