“How close are we to Covid-19 Virus”
Abstract
This paper discusses the Rhetorical elements used in the article “How Close Are We to Covid-19 Vaccine?” It summarizes the content and main ideas of the article. It highlights the specific rhetorical elements used in the article. It provides an oversight to how successful or unsuccessful these rhetorical elements are used within the article. It provides indication from the article where the rhetorical elements are portrayed. This paper is used to indicate how impactful Rhetorical elements are in achieving a successful piece of Scientific Writing.
The article “How close are we to a Covid-19 Vaccine? By Kayhan Ozkan is a reviewed article that discusses the Covid-19 Virus and its possible vaccine treatments. It explains how the Covid-19 virus affects the body. It assesses how various Vaccines have been designed to treat other diseases in the past and their effectiveness in doing so. It compares the different vaccines and assess which vaccine would be most efficient to fight the Covid-19 Virus. There are rhetorical elements within this article such as : the rhetorical situation, audience, purpose, stance, tone, medium and arrangement which is used to create an informative piece on the Covid-19 and its possible vaccine treatments.
The arrangement of the article is in Scientific style. It contains an Abstract, Introduction, Body, Conclusion and a Reference page. The article starts by discussing the anatomy of the Covid-19 virus and explains how it affects the human body. It continues to elaborate on the different vaccine candidates that could be used as a possible treatment for the Covid-19 virus. Therefore, it gives an oversight to a problem, present various information on the problem and explain how the problem can be resolve, as well as, providing a call to action. This suggest that the article is using logos to provide the facts about the Covid-19 virus, as well as, ensuring that we think about the information we are getting about the Covid-19 Virus, and how it can affect our judgement in assessing a treatment. The author also expresses ethos by quoting content from highly respectable sources.
The author of the article is Kayhan Ozkan. There is not much information presented about him in the article. However, we can tell that his article is credible because of where it is published. The medium of the review article is the Journal of Pure and Applied Microbiology. This suggest that it is highly credible source because it is published in a reliable source that is respected in its field of Biology. This evident by the article highlighting the publisher name at the bottom of every page.
The purpose of the author is to inform the people about the Covid-19 virus and the possible vaccine treatments for the virus. The article discusses the uses and effects of each vaccine candidates. It compares their effectiveness in treating other diseases to their use in potentially treating the Covid-19 virus. In the article it states, “A candidate COVID-19 vaccine could be developed with a purpose of acquiring a mechanism that grounds on the configuration of a similar immune response” (Ozkan,2020,p.897).This shows the author is clearly calling for more research to be done about the Vaccine Candidates and finding a bridge which connects to the Covid-19 virus. Therefore, the intended audience is the scientific community including Doctors and Microbiologist, as well as, a wider academic community. The article discusses medical terms that only Microbiologist and Doctors would understand. The article contains a lot of science diction, but he elaborates certain concepts in a simple way. Ozkan states “A polypeptide is used in order to protect pre-fusion structure and to prevent its reproduction after the protein penetrates into the cell” (2020, p .898). This shows that he uses Biological terms such as “polypeptides” and “pre-fusion structure” while explaining his points, but does it in a way that is comprehensible by using words that are easy to picture in the audience who lack Scientific knowledge such as: ”prevents” and “penetrates”. Moreover, in the article there is an image of the human body that show how the Covid-19 connects to the alveoli in the lungs which results in pneumonia. He is fulfilling his purpose by illustrating the explanation of how the Covid-19 virus affects the body to the audience outside the field of medicine who may not understand the terms he has explained.
The author’s stance in this article is a scientific plain style. He restricts using terms that refer to his own thoughts, for example pointing terms out in the first person. In the article Ozkan states “These data magnify the concerns about the reliability of inactive vaccines and emphasize the necessity for further studies” (2020, p. 898). This points out that author is remaining neutral on his thoughts and reveal only the what data and studies he found has shown.
The author uses an objective tone in the article. The article provides potential vaccines that can be used as possible treatments for the Covid-19 Virus. It provides details on the effectiveness and flaws of each vaccine candidates. An example is shown when he points out that one study “the inactive vaccine can induce immunity against SARS-CoV infection and the vaccine is safe in monkeys and may be demonstrate for clinical trials” (Ozkan,2020, p 898). He then points out in another study “the vaccine underperformed in aged animal models in which diploid inactivated vaccines were inoculated”(Ozkan,2020, p.898).This suggest that he just merely providing that facts on any vaccine treatment and not just promoting what treatment he feels is best.
The exigence of the article is the Covid-19 pandemic that is currently killing millions of people around the world. There is no effective treatment for the virus. Therefore, minimum efforts have been made to come up with a possible treatment for Covid-19. The author is motivated to share any information he can about the virus because there is a need to understand the how the virus operates and what can be the best solution for it.
Covid-19 virus is a dilemma that is disrupting the regular way of how the world functions. This article by Kayhan Ozkan aims to present information about the Covid-19 Virus and the assessment of the Covid-19 Vaccine Candidates. The article vividly explains how the Covid-19 virus affects the body which suggest that the article has achieved its purpose. It conforms to a scientific style of writing which allow him to remain objective and neutral throughout the article eliminating bias. Finally, he combines scientific and plain language which allow him to be understood by a wider audience.
Reference
Ozkan, K. (2020). How Close are We to a COVID-19 Vaccine? Journal of Pure and Applied Microbiology Coronaviruses and COVID-19– Past, Present, and Future,14(Suppl 1),893-902.doi:10.22207/jpam.14.spl1.26
