The UK government said on Friday it had signed deals for a further 90 million doses of coronavirus vaccines as the country raced to secure supplies of experimental shots to combat the pandemic.
Under the new agreements in principle, the American medicine developer Novavax NVAX,
will supply 60 million doses of its coronavirus vaccine to the UK Janssen Pharmaceutica, a division of Johnson & Johnson JNJ,
the UK will supply 30 million doses of its candidate.
With today’s announcement, the UK has now secured access to six different candidates, across four different fax types, and is taking its potential supply to 340 million doses – one of the largest in the world. That is enough for five doses per person.
“The government’s strategy to build a portfolio of promising vaccine candidates will ensure that we have the best chance of finding someone who works,” said UK Secretary of State Alok Sharma in a statement. only people in the UK benefit, but ensuring fair and honest access to a vaccine around the world, potentially protecting hundreds of millions of lives. “he added.
If the vaccines are safe and successful in clinical trials, both could be delivered to the UK by mid-2021, the government said.
To read:UK signs deals with BioNTech, Pfizer, and Valneva for COVID-19 faxes
The deals come as the European Commission said on Friday that it had reached an agreement with the FTSE-100 listed AstraZeneca AZN,
to purchase at least 300 million doses of their potential COVID-19 vaccine.
On Friday, Novavax announced that it would deliver 60 million doses of its coronavirus vaccine to the UK as early as the first quarter of 2021. As part of the agreement, the UK will provide a late-stage trial of Novavax’s NVAX,
vaccine candidate to assess the effectiveness of the vaccine on the population of the country.
The trial, scheduled to begin in the third quarter of 2020, will be a study in approximately 9,000 adults between the ages of 18 and 85 to protect against symptomatic COVID-19 disease, as well as evaluate anti-antibodies and T-cell responses. , Novavax said in a statement.
To read:Novavax says its COVID-19 vaccine shows promising results in the early study
Kate Bingham, chair of the UK Government’s Task Force, said it was encouraging that Novavax’s recent clinical data showed that her vaccine triggered an immune response greater than that in patients who had recovered from the disease.
“We believe Novavax has a very innovative vaccine that could be the first in its class of protein-based vaccine options. We are pleased to partner with them and worldwide organizations such as CEPI [Coalition for Epidemic Preparedness Innovations] to fulfill our mutual obligations to ensure worldwide access to the vaccine, ”she said.
Except Johnson & Johnson said its Belgian subsidiary Janssen will supply the UK government with its candidate known as Ad26.COV2-S from an initial sale of 30 million doses on a not-for-profit basis for emergency pandemic use. The UK has an option to buy an additional 22 million doses.
Ministers also agreed in principle to co-finance a worldwide clinical study of the Janssen vaccine. The next phase of clinical trials is expected to begin later this year to see if two doses of its vaccine candidate provide participants with long-term protection against coronavirus.
To read:Johnson & Johnson begin trial with COVID-19 vaccine after producing immune response in primates
In July, the government also said it had secured early access to 90 million faxed doses of two possible COVID-19 vaccines being developed through a joint venture between German BioNTech BNTX,
and American drugmaker Pfizer PFE,
as one by the French group Valneva. The same month, GlaxoSmithKline GSK,
said it has taken a stake in German vaccine maker CureVac.
The UK government had previously announced a contract with AstraZeneca for the drug maker to produce 100 million doses of its potential vaccine, developed in collaboration with the University of Oxford.
Novavax said it would partner with Fujifilm Diosynth Biotechnologies to produce the antigen component of its coronavirus vaccine candidate, NVX-CoV2373, from the Billingham, Stockton-on-Tees site in the UK, to as many as 180 annually. to produce million doses of the vaccine.
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