These health heroes have volunteered to be participants in clinical trials of COVID-19 vaccines that are currently in development.
These volunteers come from various walks of life and express a variety of reasons for becoming involved.
Common to all, however, is a desire to put an end to this pandemic.
Their inspiring stories, told in their own words, have been lightly edited for length and clarity.
Because of severe asthma, I’d been fighting to exist my whole life.
I’d been in and out of hospitals, ICUs, and on life support 13 times.
Like most African Americans, I wasn’t very trusting of the medical community.
My friends and I discussed waiting a few years to see if the vaccine was safe or not.
So I started doing research and heard about the clinical trial at the University of Illinois at Chicago.
I didn’t get a sign that I shouldn’t do it so I signed up.
I got the first injection in late August and the second in late September.
I wanted to do my part for humanity because this microorganism we can’t see is destroying mankind.
This is just my small contribution so that we can all live and be well.
My wife is a primary care physician, and I had seen her worrying about the virus.
When I heard about the opportunity to enroll in a phase III clinical trial, I thought, Wow!
I can do something.
I’m a healthy South-Asian American my parents are from India and I don’t have any preexisting conditions.
