It has been six months now, when the first world learned about the deadly coronavirus. Scientists, medical experts, and researchers across the globe are working in unprecedented ways to develop a vaccine or a treatment for COVID-19.
More than 100 projects are running across the globe to find a cure for SARS-CoV-19. Among front runners currently in human trials are the vaccines being developed by AstraZeneca, Pfizer, BioNtech, Johnson & Johnson, Merck, Moderna, Sanofi, and China’s CanSino Biologics.
COVID-19 vaccine latest updates:
US biotech firm Moderna
A vaccine against COVID-19 developed by US biotech firm Moderna will enter the third and final stage of its clinical trial in July with 30,000 participants, the manufacturer has announced.
According to the Cambridge, Massachusetts-based biotech, the primary goal of the study would be to prevent symptomatic COVID-19. The second goal would be the prevention of severe disease, as defined by keeping people out of the hospital.
The firm said that it has selected the 100 microgram dose of the vaccine for the late-stage study and is on track to deliver about 500 million doses per year. Starting in 2021 from the company’s internal U.S. manufacturing site and strategic collaboration with Swiss drugmaker Lonza it can manufacture up to 1 billion doses per year.
Johnson & Johnson
Johnson & Johnson, which is also contributing to curb this virus spread being is slated to begin its human trials next month i.e. July. It is important to note that the company is proceeding with its clinical trials at least two months ahead of the predicted time frame.
The vaccine candidate developed by J & J is based on adenovirus (a virus causing common cold) and the company plans to test its efficacy and safety against a placebo by dosing both younger and older volunteers. The drugmaker will check the immune safety response of the vaccine candidate in 1,045 individuals in the United States and Belgium.
In March, J&J signed deals with the US government to create enough manufacturing capacity to produce more than 1 billion doses of its vaccine through 2021, Reuters reported.
Chief Scientific Officer Paul Stoffels said, “Based on the strength of the pre-clinical data we have seen so far and interactions with the regulatory authorities, we have been able to further accelerate the clinical development”.
The company is also in talks with the National Institutes of Allergy and Infectious Diseases to start larger, late-stage trials ahead of schedule, depending on the results of the early studies and regulatory approval.
National Institutes of Health Director Dr. Francis Collins told Reuters that companies will need to complete their safety trials by the end of summer to be included in those studies.
Biotech firm Panacea Biotec Ltd
Coming to India, Bengaluru based Biotech firm Panacea Biotec Ltd, on Wednesday said that it would partner with US-based Refana Inc to make a potential vaccine for SARS-CoV-19.
Panacea said stock exchanges in a statement that the collaboration aims to make more than 500 million doses of the vaccine candidate, with over 40 million doses expected to be available early next year.
Shares of Panacea BiotecNSE -5.04 % on Wednesday zoomed 20 percent after the company’s announcement. “Whole inactivated viral vaccines have a higher probability of being safe and efficacious, given their long history and a better understanding of their mechanism of action, which has been elucidated over many decades,” PTI quoted Panacea Biotec Managing Director Rajesh Jain as saying.
Serum Institute of India
Another candidate from India for the development of the COVID-19 vaccine is a Pune-based Serum Institute of India (SII). The company, which is known to produce over 10 million doses of vaccines in a year used for treating other diseases has partnered with the University of Oxford to speed up the development of a safe and affordable coronavirus vaccine. While the Oxford University vaccine shows success rates SII is speeding up efforts to produce the vaccine and making sure that vaccine doses are available as early as October 2020.
Bharat Biotech
Vaccine maker Bharat Biotech and Thomas Jefferson University of Philadelphia signed an exclusive deal to develop a new vaccine candidate for coronavirus. According to Bharat Biotech, the vaccine was developed using an existing deactivated rabies vaccine as a vehicle for coronavirus proteins. Recently tested on animals, the vaccine showed a strong antibody response in mice, according to the company.
Chinese firm Sinovac
Chinese firm Sinovac, one of the front-runners in the race of developing a vaccine for COVID-19, is 99 percent sure of its vaccine efficacy. The potential vaccine by the Chinese drugmaker had shown promising results in its animal trials as it was able to develop protective antibodies in monkeys.
As per an online report published on server bioRxiv, the vaccine which has been dubbed CoronaVac, largely protected the monkeys from developing an infection.
According to the report by Sky News, Luo Baishan, a researcher at Sinovac said that they are 99 percent sure the vaccine will work.
AstraZeneca
Drugmaker AstraZeneca has finalised its licence agreement with Oxford University for the recombinant adenovirus vaccine. AstraZeneca has recently approached US rival Gilead Sciences to join hands for the production of the vaccine candidate AZD1222, which was formerly called ChAdOx1 nCoV-19. If the merger is successful, it could further strengthen the global efforts to quickly produce a vaccine for the novel coronavirus and may be made available for mass immunisation. Developed within 3 months, the potential vaccine is developed using a weakened strain of the common cold virus (adenovirus) and combining it with the genetic material of spike protein of the novel coronavirus.
The Phase-I trial in healthy adult volunteers began in April. More than 1,000 immunisations have been completed and follow-up is currently ongoing. The next study will enroll up to 10,260 adults and children and will involve several partner institutions.
Pfizer, the pharmaceutical giant
Pfizer, the pharmaceutical giants’ CEO claims coronavirus vaccine could be ready by October end. The company has started the process of dosing patients in collaboration with a German company, BNTECH. Four vaccine candidates devised out of messenger RNA (mRNA) format are being tested on volunteers to identify the most viable and suited vaccine of the four. The data is being shared with scientists in real-time. The tests are currently going on in Germany and parts of the USA.
Pfizer believes that a Covid-19 vaccine could be ready by the end of October 2020, reported The Times of Israel, citing Albert Bourla, the CEO of the firm.
CanSino
A China-based company developed CanSino vaccine and proceeded to stage 2 of the study. In the testing done so far, participants who received a single dose of the vaccine produced certain immune cells, called T cells, within two weeks while the antibodies needed for immunity peaked at 28 days.
