The UK government has allocated £ 20 million ($ 26.4 million) to accelerate the creation of a vaccine against the new coronavirus, UK Department of Health and Social Care said in a statement.

These funds are directed to the International Epidemic Preparedness Coalition (CEPI), which includes public, private and charitable organizations. The creation of this organization for the development of vaccines to prevent epidemics was announced in 2017 in Davos.

According to CEPI Executive Director Richard Hatchett, the organization hopes to receive the vaccine within 16 weeks. The first stage of the subsequent clinical examination will take, as he said, at least two to four months.

This is an extremely ambitious schedule in this area, said Hatchett noting that even if they succeed then they may face other problems that need to be addressed before the vaccine becomes widely available.