USC's Keck School seeks volunteers for COVID-19 vaccine trial
USC's Keck School of Medicine, along with Vernon's health department, is enrolling volunteers in a Phase 3 clinical trial to test an experimental vaccine for COVID-19.
LOS ANGELES (KABC) -- USC's Keck School of Medicine, along with Vernon's health department, is enrolling volunteers in a Phase 3 clinical trial to test an experimental vaccine for COVID-19.
Keck Medicine of USC is seeking 500 volunteers for the trial -- particularly participants at the greatest risk of contracting the virus, including those in Black and brown communities, those older than 65 and factory workers.
Researchers are looking to register 30,000 people across the country and 500 in Los Angeles.
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The trial will operate out of two locations: Keck Hospital of USC in the Boyle Heights are of Los Angeles, and a satellite location in Vernon.
Keck Medicine of USC will be testing the safety and effectiveness of an experimental vaccine known as AZD1222 produced by AstraZeneca, a Cambridge, UK-based pharmaceutical company, and funded by the U.S. Biomedical Advanced Research and Development Authority and the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases.
"The Vernon Health Department is proud to collaborate with Keck Medicine of USC on this critically important medical investigation that, if successful, could result in a safe and effective vaccine to provide immunity for hundreds of millions of Americans against the virus that causes COVID-19 which has taken the lives of nearly 170,000 men, women and children in the U.S. more than 760,000 people worldwide,'' said Fredrick Agyin, director of the Vernon Health and Environmental Control Department.
"We look forward to working closely with Vernon's business community and leaders of organized labor to recruit the volunteers needed to participate in what could be a huge turning point in the public health battle against COVID-19.''
More information can be found at www.cityofvernon.org/departments/health.
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City News Service contributed to this report.
