In 2020, the year of COVID-19, the greatest scientific discovery is a vaccine. In a year that was all about COVID-19 and the losses it incurred — lives, incomes, personal freedom, physical contact and simple handshakes — the development of vaccines for the deadly pandemic stands out as a top scientific and technology discovery of 2020. By December, several researchers had announced positive results from trials, in record time. The quickest turnaround for a vaccine up to then was in the 1960s, when developers went from viral sampling to approval in four years for mumps immunization, the journal Nature reported. Early in the month in Britain and the U.S., shipments began of coronavirus vaccine vials made by pharmaceutical giant Pfizer and the German firm BioNTech. On Dec. 18, the Food and Drug Administration gave emergency approval to Moderna's vaccine for people 18 and over. In a public show of support, Dr. Anthony Fauci, the nation's top epidemiologist, got the Moderna immunization along with other health officials in a press conference just days before Christmas.