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A NEW Covid-19 vaccine produced by a team involving two Irish scientists could be ready for launch before Christmas, one of the top doctors said today.
Professor Adrian Hill, team leader from the Jenner Institute at the University of Oxford, said the injection could be up to 90 percent effective in repeated doses.
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Most importantly, however, it could be much easier to transport and store than two other vaccines already developed by Pfizer and Moderna because it does not need to be deep-frozen and can be stored in a normal refrigerator.
Dubliner Prof Hill and his colleague Professor Teresa Lambe from Co Kildare are on the team that has been working on the drug since last January alongside pharmaceutical giant AstraZeneca.
The two had previously helped lead the team that produced a successful vaccine for the killer Ebola virus six years ago, while Professor Hill has been part of groundbreaking research on malaria.
He said that while it was important to have as many vaccines on the market as possible, the main advantage of theirs is that they can be stored between 2 ° C and 8 ° C in a home refrigerator.
DOSAGE REGIME
Pfizer’s jab should be kept between -70 ° C and -80 ° C to avoid spoilage, requiring the use of ultra-low temperature freezers, while Moderna’s vaccine should be shipped at -20 ° C.
While the other two companies claim to have efficacy rates of more than 95 percent, the Oxford version has been shown to be 90 percent effective, depending on how it is applied.
Professor Lambe said: “We can achieve an efficacy of up to 90 percent if we change the dosage regimen.
“The first dose we give is half the standard dose, so we follow it up with a standard dose. And we see that efficiency increases. “
She told RTE’s Claire Byrne: “Having a dosing regimen where we can get half the first dose is an advantage. We will get more out of our money.
“No one who received the vaccine was hospitalized. The data is being redacted as I speak and will be released in a matter of days, hopefully. ”
His colleague Professor Hill said another advantage of the Oxford vaccine is that it relies on a type of technology, known as an adenoviral vector, that has already been used safely for decades.
In contrast, those of Pfizer and Moderna use a less established form of administration known as mRNA.
VACCINE STORAGE
The Irish Sun reported on Saturday that a lack of necessary ultra-low-temperature freezers is feared to prevent the delivery of the Pfizer injection, of which Ireland has already received 2 million doses.
Speaking about his team’s new finding, Professor Hill told RTE’s News at One: “There are licensed vaccines with this technology. It is distributed in a refrigerator, between 2 ° C and 8 ° C.
“The other two that have shown that they work need freezers, which is quite difficult in Ireland but really difficult in some parts of the developing world.
“That’s important, but the other reason less novel technology is used that is useful in an outbreak is that you literally can’t have the depth of time of security data on something that has only been in the world. clinic for months.
“While adenoviral vectors were in the first trial in 1991, they have been widely used for the past 15 years and tens of thousands have been safely vaccinated and followed for years.
“The average vaccine takes about ten years to develop, we have been working for ten months. But if you analyze why you can do it faster, it is comforting.
“First, we don’t have to wait for grant applications to be written, which is the case in universities all the time: regulators respond, putting us at the top of the list.
“Everything takes priority at the manufacturing facility, we go in right away.
“So that’s a big part of the time reduction. Now there are hundreds of millions of doses available, waiting to be used once we get regulatory approval for this vaccine.
“So many things are kaleidoscopic, as is appropriate in this emergency. We start from the requirement that this be a global vaccine.
“We have ten different countries of manufacture and contracts that our industrial partner AstraZeneca has assumed amount to around three billion doses.
“That will be a record if it happens. No vaccine has been given to more than 500 million people in one year.
“So we are trying to do something unprecedented. But it may well be possible. We are reasonably well located.
“We are going to look for something called an emergency use authorization, which will be much shorter than the standard six to 12 months.
“We suppose it could be a couple of weeks. With a favorable wind, hopefully the approvals before Christmas and the first vaccines next month ”.
‘NEVER WORKED HARDER’
Professor Lambe said that she had never worked so hard in her life as in the last ten months.
She said: “It’s been all hands-on, it’s been seven days a week and there have been no interruptions. It has been relentless. Fortunately it has been worth it.
“We started on January 10th, that’s when I got the email that helped me jointly design a vaccine over the weekend. It was a busy weekend.
“It has been a busy year, it has been absolutely manic.
“Normally, it takes up to ten years to develop a vaccine.
“What we have done are risky steps, and that at no time implies that we have assumed security risks, they have been monetary risks. That is why we needed a partner like AstraZeneca and our other partners. “
Oxford Vaccine Group Director Andrew Pollard said his affordable and scalable vaccine could be a game changer globally.
He said: “We have a vaccine for the world because we have a vaccine that is very effective: it prevents diseases and hospitalizations.”
The news about the Oxford vaccine came as questions about the cost, manufacture and storage of Pfizer’s jab continue to emerge.
By requiring much colder temperatures than a standard freezer, there have been concerns about whether low- and middle-income countries will be able to access it.
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Experts say that Moderna and Pfizer hits are likely to cost between € 12-22 per dose, while AstraZeneca has promised to sell their injection at a cost, around € 3-4.
More than 23,000 adults in the UK and Brazil have taken part in the trials, and the number is expected to rise to 60,000 thanks to trials that are also taking place in other countries.
The first results suggested that there were 131 cases of Covid-19 among the participants, but none were serious.
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