A pandemic can be a powerful stimulus for innovation. Following the 1918 influenza pandemic, one of the deadliest in history, governments and health organizations poured millions of dollars into research on infectious diseases and vaccines to address them. This effort laid the groundwork for vaccines against yellow fever, polio, measles, rubella, and hepatitis A and B. COVID-19 presents another opportunity to establish new vaccine R&D norms that could prevent future pandemics and check ongoing disease threats like malaria, TB and HIV. Less than one year after the virus was first identified, health agencies have approved safe and effective vaccines that are already being deployed in some communities to control the pandemic.