As nations around the world compete to develop a vaccine to defend against COVID-19, the United States is rushing to be at the forefront of the battle.
In early April 2020, the administration of President Donald Trump announced Operation Warp Speed, A flagship federal initiative to accelerate the development of drugs to combat the new coronavirus. The United States government has so farinvested more than $ 5 billion in more than 30 research projects for the development of vaccines, diagnostics and treatments.
At least 4.2 million Americans have been infected with the new coronavirus, and more than 146,000 have died from the disease, according to Johns Hopkins University.
What is Operation Warp Speed?
According to the U.S. Health and Human Services, Operation Warp Speed aims to deliver 300 million doses of a safe and effective vaccine by January 2021.
Under the initiative, the government will accelerate development and buy vaccines, before they are considered safe and effective, so that the drug can be made available and distributed quickly once the FDA approves or authorizes its emergency use after clinical trials.
Americans will receive the vaccine for free, the companies said.
What companies have been funded so far to develop vaccines?
1. Modern
Moderna announced on July 27 that it had begun a late-stage trial to assess the effectiveness of its vaccine candidate – the first such trial under Operation Warp Speed and the final hurdle before regulatory approval.
The Moderna study will evaluate the response to the vaccine in 30,000 adults who do not have respiratory disease. The company, which has never released a vaccine to the market, received nearly $ 1 billion from the United States government, which chose it as one of the first to participate in large-scale human trials.
The late-stage trial is designed to assess the safety of Moderna mRNA-1273 and to determine if the vaccine can prevent symptomatic COVID-19 after two doses. The study also seeks to answer whether the vaccine can prevent death from COVID-19, and whether just one dose can prevent symptomatic COVID-19.
Moderna said it is on track to deliver approximately 500 million doses a year, and possibly up to a billion doses a year, starting in 2021.
More than 150 coronavirus vaccine candidates are at various stages of development, with 23 prospects in human trials worldwide and Moderna’s candidate among the most advanced in development. [Brian Snyder/Reuters]
2. Pfizer / BioNTech SE
Pfizer Inc and German biotechnology BioNTech SEhave received $ 1.95bn in funds from the United States government to develop a A vaccine that uses the chemical messenger RNA to instruct cells to make proteins that mimic the surface of the coronavirus, which the immune system sees as a foreign invader and mounts an attack. Although the technology has been around for years, there has never been an approved messenger RNA (mRNA) vaccine.
The company aims to make up to 100 million doses by the end of 2020 and potentially more than 1.2 billion doses by the end of 2021. The vaccine has already shown promise in small, early-stage human studies, producing the type Neutralizing Antibodies Needed to Fight the Virus In these trials, subjects received two doses of the vaccine.
3. Novavax
On July 7, the United States government awarded Novavax $ 1.6 billion for its potential vaccine. The company aims to start mid-stage tests in August or September, with Phase III tests starting in October, with the goal of delivering 100 million doses in January. The Novavax vaccine works in conjunction with an adjuvant, a substance that boosts the immune response to help the body build a strong defense against the virus.
A person receiving a clinical trial injection of a potential COVID-19 vaccine at the Kaiser Permanente Washington Health Research Institute in Seattle [Ted S Warren/AP Photo]
4. AstraZeneca
Developed by the University of Oxford, AstraZeneca has received $ 1.2 billion in federal funds from the United States. The experimental vaccine It is made up of a recombinant viral vector vaccine that uses a weakened version of a common cold virus that encodes instructions to make proteins from the new coronavirus to build immunity.
5. Johnson & Johnson
With a $ 456 million investment from the US government, Johnson & Johnson (J&J) aims to begin an advanced-stage study of its experimental vaccine in September, leaving other companies on this list.
The J&J candidate is developing what is known as a viral vector vaccine, which is based on a virus that does not replicate to carry genetic instructions to body cells. Those instructions tell the cell to make viral proteins that would train the immune system to fend off real infections in the future.
A medical worker holding a bottle labeled ‘Vaccine COVID-19’ [Dado Ruvic/Reuters]
6. Merck & Co
Merck & Co received $ 38 million in US federal funds to develop a recombinant vaccine based on the same COVID-19 technology used in the company’s Ebola vaccine. Human trials are expected sometime this year.
7. Sanofi SA
With some $ 30.7 million in US government funding, Sanofi is developing a recombinant SARS-CoV-2 protein vaccine, based on the FDA-licensed seasonal influenza vaccine. The company plans to enroll thousands of subjects worldwide for initial testing.
SOURCE:
Al Jazeera and news agencies
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