Covid vaccine ushers in a ray of hope

Paris: On Monday, the French pharmaceutical company, Sanofi and GSK of Britain reported that the clinical trials of their Covid-19 vaccine bore positive results and that it can be included in the vaccine arsenal of the world.

In the upcoming week, the companies shall have the result of the Phase 2 study and this shall help them to move on to the late-stage trial. This shall alter the fortune after a failure in the last research in the previous year.

Sanofi and GSK stated that the experimental vaccine “achieved rates of neutralizing antibody response, in line with those measured in people who have recovered from Covid-19.”

722 senior volunteers were included in the trials.

The previous study in the later part of 2020 pointed out that the vaccine lent a low immunity in aged people. The companies opined that the vaccine shall be ready at the end of the year.

The previous failure diminished the French pride because France is the only permanent member of the UN Security Council that didn’t have any vaccine after Britain, China, Russia and the United States’ success.

Thomas Triomphe, executive vice president and global head of Sanofi Pasteur exclaimed, “Our Phase 2 data confirm the potential of this vaccine to play a role in addressing this ongoing public health crisis.”

He further stated, “As we know multiple vaccines will be needed, especially as variants continue to emerge and the need for effective and booster vaccines, which can be stored at normal temperatures, increases.”

The companies reported that 35,000 senior people shall undergo the final phase of the trial “in a broad range of countries”. This will most probably start in the later part of May or in the beginning of June.

It shall detect the efficacy of the vaccine against the strain noted in Wuhan, China in the later part of 2019 and the one visible in South Africa. The earlier candidate was tested against the Wuhan variant only.

The companies hope to get approval from the regulators in the later part of this year.

The firms are blending a Sanofi-developed antigen with GSK’s adjuvant technology. The antigen stimulates the production of germ-killing antibodies and the technology is a substance that bolsters the immunity that the vaccine triggers.

The Phase 2 trial points out that after the second jab, the vaccine develops a “strong immune response” among adults by producing antibodies- in between 95 and 100 per cent, Sanofi and GSK opined.

The volunteers were aged in between 18 to 95 years.

The research exclaims that for people who has been previously infected with the virus, one dose produces higher levels of antibodies.

Europe is getting vaccines that the British pharmaceutical firm AstraZeneca and US company Johnson & Johnson produced.

Olivier Bogillot, Sanofi president of France reported to Europe 1 radio that Sanofi is planning to provide the doses to the United States, Canada and European Union.

He further added, “Most countries were waiting for the Phase 2 results to be able to initiate orders.”

Sanofi along with Translate Bio, a US-based firm, is manufacturing a second vaccine while making use of the same messenger RNA technology that Pfizer-BioNTech and Moderna used.