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The "Corona situation" isn't going to be "over" in our lifetime. The first polio vaccine was developed in the 1950s, but the most recent had polio epidemic was this past September, almost a year ago. Taking a more nuanced view, it's already "over" for many people in lots of countries - offices, restaurants, hair salons, and bars are open. Places where people aren't wearing masks because they don't need to, and no one's getting COVID-19. In a sane world, the government's reopening plans aren't dictated by the local restaurant owners, but rather by health organizations run by scientists. In such a world, concerts won't happen again before it is actually safe to do so. Surprisingly, there are some places in the world where that is actually the case! The question though, isn't if a particular drug is safe or not. That's a very important question to answer, and one of the hurdles to pass, but in this context, the ethics are around exposing people to a potentially fatal disease, without actually knowing if the vaccine being tested successfully protects against the disease. If we inject people with a vaccine, and then with large amounts of the SARS-Cov-2 virus, and they develop COVID-19, then we can say that the vaccine being tested on them didn't work in that case. Unfortunately we directly injected them with a potentially lethal disease, possibly resulting in a life-long disability. It's that last step that most hospital ethics boards aren't willing to take. |