The World Health Organization's (WHO) top scientist said Monday that COVID-19 vaccines will probably be available in December or early 2021 for submission to regulators for approval.

Axar.az informs that, Dr. Soumya Swaminathan said: "It's very encouraging to see the progress in the clinical trials that are happening all around the world."

He added: "As you know, we have about 40 vaccine candidates now in some stage of clinical trials, and 10 of them are in the Phase 3 trials, which are the late-stage clinical trials, which will tell us about both the efficacy and the safety."

He said that the earliest date for a vaccine to come onto the market to submit to regulators "is starting from December of 2020, into the early part of 2021."