Moderna Inc. recently announced plans to start the third phase of its COVID-19 vaccine study in July. The study would involve over 30,000 volunteers during the final stage of testing.

The Massachusetts-based biotech firm aims to test whether the vaccine could prevent coronavirus symptoms from developing. The researchers also hope the vaccine could keep people out of the hospital, Reuters reports.

Moderna was the first company to begin giving the first dose of its experimental drug in early March. The company initially tested different doses of the vaccine on volunteers. However, they chose the 100-microgram dose for the final phase of the trial.

Study on Safety

On Friday, the biotech company published preliminary data of the coronavirus vaccine's effect in mice. According to the report, the treatment will not increase the risk of developing more severe disease. It also showed one dose may provide enough protection against the virus.

In the new study, researchers injected one or two shots of varying doses of Moderna's vaccine to six-week-old mice. The vaccinated animals were then exposed to the virus. Subsequent analyses suggested the vaccine did not make the test subjects more susceptible to more severe diseases.

Further testing also showed the vaccine caused potent antibody responses needed to keep the virus from infecting healthy cells.

Prior studies conducted on a SARS vaccine suggested treatments against this type of virus may unintentionally cause more severe disease when the vaccinated person is later exposed to the disease, Yahoo Finance said.

The results of the previous studies posed a threat which scientists claimed should be cleared before the vaccine could be tested in thousands of healthy volunteers.

Other Vaccines

Other researchers and medical institutions have also announced trials and studies into a safe and effective treatment against the virus.

On Thursday, Johnson & Johnson announced it is accelerating trials of its COVID-19 vaccine as it races to deliver treatments before a potential second wave. The U.S. pharmaceutical giant said it will begin human clinical trials in mid-July, with the final stage of testing beginning in September, as reported by Bloomberg.

Pfizer has also partnered with German company, BioNTech, to start its human trials in the United States in mid-May.

In April, the New York-based pharmaceutical company gave experimental shots to 12 healthy adults in Germany, with plans to expand the trial to involve 200 participants.

In the United States, Pfizer plans to recruit 360 volunteers for phase I. The second stage is expected to involve 8,000 participants and will be conducted at universities in New York, Maryland, and Rochester, as well as at a children's hospital in Cincinnati.

Other companies currently researching a coronavirus vaccine includes the American company Inovio, Imperial College London, Curevac, AstraZeneca and the University of Oxford, CanSino Biologics, Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center, Novartis, Massachusetts Eye and Ear Hospital, and more.

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