Next Success With Corona Vaccine: AstraZeneca Vaccine 90 Percent Effective – Coronavirus Vienna

After partners BioNTech and Pfizer, as well as the American group Moderna, the British pharmaceutical giant together with the University of Oxford presented positive data: the vaccine could achieve about 90 percent effectiveness against Covid-19, there were no effects serious side effects, AstraZeneca said. Monday with.

“We have a vaccine for the world,” said Oxford University Vaccine Group Leader Andrew Pollard. Not only does it avoid difficult courses and hospital stays, but it can also be stored at refrigerator temperature. Therefore, the vaccine can be distributed worldwide through the usual vaccine distribution channels.

Biontech’s vaccine, on the other hand, requires ultra-cold storage of minus 70 degrees and can be kept for five days at normal refrigerator temperature. Moderna expects its vaccine to be stable for 30 days in refrigerator temperatures and to be stored at minus 20 degrees Celsius for up to six months.

Mainz biotech company Biontech and its US partner Pfizer and Moderna had achieved about 95 percent effectiveness with their vaccines after two doses of vaccines in studies relevant to approval. On Friday, Biontech and Pfizer applied for an emergency permit in the US and expect it in mid-December. AstraZeneca plans to begin discussions with the US FDA later this week and send data to authorities around the world that will allow for swift action.

The effectiveness of the AstraZeneca vaccine is dose dependent. 90 percent efficacy was achieved when the vaccine was administered initially with a half dose, followed by a full dose at intervals of at least one month. When two full doses were vaccinated at least a month apart, only 62 percent effectiveness was achieved based on interim analysis. The scientists cautioned, however, that this should be taken as evidence that the vaccine was less effective than the competition.

It makes little sense to differentiate vaccines based on extracts from phase 3 data, said Danny Altman, professor of immunology at Imperial College London. “I think in a year we will use all three vaccines with a protection of about 90 percent and we will be much happier.”

“The data shows that the vaccine was highly effective in preventing Covid-19 infection, the primary endpoint, with no hospitalizations or severe cases of the disease reported in participants who received the vaccine,” Botond Ponner said. AstraZeneca Austria Medical Director. Furthermore, interim results would have shown particularly good tolerability in older adults.

AstraZeneca aims to have completed 200 million cans by the end of the year and 700 million cans worldwide by the end of the first quarter of 2021. Biontech and Pfizer expect to produce up to 50 million doses of vaccines worldwide by 2020 and up to 1.3 billion in 2021. Many governments have already obtained millions of doses of the AstraZeneca vaccine in advance, and the European Commission has also signed a purchase agreement for up to 400 million doses. British Health Secretary Matt Hancock said it was “fantastic news”. “We have ordered 100 million cans, and if all goes well, most of the delivery will be in the New Year,” he told Sky News. The UK is one of the countries hardest hit by the pandemic in Europe, with more than 1.5 million people infected with the virus to date. The UK government expects a gradual return to normal after Easter.

The vaccines that have led the way so far differ mainly in their method of production. While the Biontech and Moderna vaccines are based on a completely new technology, AstraZeneca’s is based on a conventional manufacturing method. The vaccine, which is being developed with the University of Oxford, is a so-called monkey adenovirus-based vector vaccine. It is supposed to smuggle the genetic material of the virus into human cells, and the immune system reacts with the formation of antibodies.

The Biontech and Moderna vaccines, on the other hand, are based on so-called messenger RNA (mRNA), which is supposed to transmit information to human cells about the production of proteins and, therefore, about the fight against pathogens. Such a vaccine should be able to be manufactured on a large scale faster than conventional ones. But it also requires a higher level of refrigeration, making logistics difficult. Long-term experience is also lacking, as no drug or mRNA vaccine has yet been introduced to the market.

Austro-American virus researcher Peter Palese is excited about the progress of Covid-19 vaccines. The candidates from Biontech and Moderna in particular are “wonderful.” However, he estimates that a dose will cost between $ 100 and $ 150. The EU Commission has so far kept a low profile on this. There is no need to fear that an RNA vaccine will alter the genetic material – messenger RNA cannot be incorporated into chromosomes. “These enzymes don’t exist.”

Palese, a native of Linz, is chair of the Department of Microbiology at Mount Sinai School of Medicine in New York, specializing in influenza viruses. In the JKU Corona update on Monday, in a conversation with Linz University Rector Meinhard Lukas, he described his experiences with Covid-19: At the end of March, 2,200 beds on Mount Sinai were occupied with corona cases. ” and 80 of them died per day. ” We have never seen anything like it ”. It is even more important to have a vaccine soon, which would be “a breakthrough.”

Corona vaccines developed so quickly because a lot of money had flowed in, according to Palese. “There is no other vaccine that has so much money.” Compare the development to the “Manhattan Project” (camouflage name for the development of the American atomic bomb in the 1940s, note): “We have more than 100,000 people in the United States who are working on Covid-19,” including the technology is new and probably only a few “question that we should hurry”.

In principle, there are three ways to make vaccines, Palese explained: You can weaken a virus, as with the smallpox vaccine, or you can take an inactivated virus. However, both are associated with a high risk of infection during production. The third and new approach is RNA vaccines. Only one part of the virus is used, namely the messenger RNA. The protein for this is not produced in the laboratory, “but in your own body.”

The two RNA vaccines are said to be 95 percent effective, with the rest of the people contracting “a very mild form of Covid-19,” he saw the data himself, according to Palese. The fact that everyone who receives a vaccine produces antibodies “hardly exists anywhere.” He is convinced that there is not a single one of the top ten candidates to fear. “Even if the vaccine isn’t 100 percent, but a 75-year-old only has the symptoms of a 25-year-old, a lot has been gained.”