Chinese vaccine manufacturer CanSino Biologics signs on its building in Tianjin, China
Suzhou:
Chinese vaccine developer CanSino Biologics is in talks with Russia, Brazil, Chile and Saudi Arabia to launch a phase III trial of its experimental COVID-19 vaccine, its co-founder said on Saturday.
China’s success in reducing COVID-19 infections has made it more difficult to conduct large-scale vaccine trials, and so far only a few countries have agreed to work with it.
“We are contacting Russia, Brazil, Chile and Saudi Arabia (for the phase III trial), and this is still under discussion,” said Qiu Dongxu, executive director and co-founder of CanSino, at the conference. ‘conference on the development of antiviral drugs in Suzhou, eastern China.
He said his phase III trial should start “very soon” and that the company plans to recruit 40,000 participants for the test.
His COVID-19 candidate, Ad5-nCov, became the first in China to pass human testing in March, but lags behind other potential vaccines in terms of trial progress. Two experimental vaccines developed by Sinovac Biotech and a unit from the China National Pharmaceutical Group (Sinopharm) are already approved for phase III trials.
Qiu said his phase II trial involving 508 people had “far better” results than phase I on safety and the ability to trigger an immune response. He did not disclose specific evidence.
He said his new factory under construction in China would allow him to produce 100 to 200 million doses of coronavirus vaccines per year by the start of 2021.
The Chinese military, whose research unit is co-developing the candidate vaccine, approved its military use last month, while two experimental Sinopharm shots are offered to employees of state-owned enterprises traveling abroad.
Zeng Guang, a former chief epidemiologist at the China Center for Disease Control and Prevention, told the conference that Chinese construction groups abroad, in particular, were keen to take experimental vaccines.
He also said that discussion should start on whether to start emergency inoculation of experimental vaccines “now”.
There is still no vaccine approved for COVID-19, a respiratory disease caused by the new coronavirus, which has killed more than half a million people worldwide.
(Corrects 4th and 6th paragraphs to remove references to several phase III and phase II trials)
(Report by Roxanne Liu in Suzhou and Tony Munroe in Beijing; Editing by Miyoung Kim and Jane Merriman)
(This story has not been edited by GalacticGaming staff and is automatically generated from a syndicated feed.)
