COVID vaccine trial stopped after volunteer developed unexplained illness (Representational)
London:
Pharmaceutical company AstraZeneca said Tuesday that it had “voluntarily stopped” a randomized clinical trial of its coronavirus vaccine in what it called routine action after a volunteer developed an unexplained illness.
The company, which is developing the drug in conjunction with the University of Oxford, is pioneering the global race for a Covid-19 vaccine.
“As part of the ongoing global randomized controlled trials of the Oxford coronavirus vaccine, our standard review process was activated and we voluntarily stopped vaccination to allow for review of safety data by an independent committee,” he said a spokesman.
“This is a routine action that has to happen whenever there is a potentially unexplained illness in one of the trials, while it is being investigated, ensuring that we maintain the integrity of the trials.”
He added that in large trials, illnesses sometimes happen by chance, but they need to be reviewed independently.
“We are working to expedite the review of the single event to minimize any potential impact on the trial schedule,” the spokesperson added.
It was not immediately clear where the patient was, or the nature and severity of his illness.
Arrests during clinical trials are not uncommon, but this is believed to be the first time it has occurred in a trial of the Covid-19 vaccine.
AstraZeneca is one of nine companies currently in late stage phase 3 trials for their vaccine candidates.
In the United States, the company began enrolling 30,000 volunteers at dozens of sites on Aug. 31.
The vaccine, called AZD1222, uses a weakened version of an adenovirus that causes the common cold that has been engineered to encode the spike protein that the new coronavirus uses to invade cells.
After vaccination, this protein is produced within the human body, which prepares the immune system to attack the coronavirus if the person is subsequently infected.
(Except for the headline, this story has not been edited by NDTV staff and is posted from a syndicated feed.)
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