Dock. Ministry of Health
JAKARTA – Minister of Health Budi Gunadi Sadikin expressed the urgency to accelerate the provision of new Tuberculosis (TBC) vaccines.
The Minister of Health believes that the TB vaccine can be an economical and beneficial protection solution for society, including reducing the economic impact due to health care costs and lost productivity.
“If TB elimination is to be achieved by 2030, we only have 3 years to develop a TB vaccine so that it can be used in 2028. Vaccine development must be carried out in a focused manner,” said Minister of Health Budi at the 37th ??Stop TB Partnership (STP) Board Meeting in City of Brasilia, Brazil.
Minister of Health Budi, as a board member from countries affected by TB, also expressed his idea to convince all members of the G20 countries to make adequate investments so that a new TB vaccine can be available in the next three years.
Currently, the TB vaccine available is the Bacillus Calmette-Guerin (BCG) vaccine. The BCG vaccine provides partial protection to prevent severe TB in infants and early childhood, but is not enough to protect children and adults from TB.
The development of an effective TB vaccine for all ages, especially for children and adults, is needed to achieve a 90% reduction in incidence and a 95% reduction in deaths due to TB.
The TB vaccine also has the potential to curb the spread of drug-resistant TB, which is a type of tuberculosis that does not respond to standard treatments that are generally effective for treating tuberculosis infections.
Currently, several TB vaccine candidates under development have the potential to prevent TB disease in children and adults, replace or strengthen the BCG vaccine, prevent relapse in patients who have completed treatment, or shorten the duration of treatment.
Indonesia itself is actively contributing to three clinical trials of TB vaccine candidates. The first is the vaccine developed by the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation (BMGF).
This vaccine, which was originally developed by the British pharmaceutical company, GSK, uses recombinant protein.
To develop this vaccine, epidemiological research was conducted in Indonesia which revealed that more than 30% of the sample population in this study may have been infected with TB.
Second, a vaccine developed in collaboration with a pharmaceutical company from China, CanSinoBio, and a biopharmaceutical company from Indonesia, Etana. The development of this vaccine uses a viral vector and is currently in the first phase of clinical trials.
Third, a vaccine developed by a biotechnology company from Germany, BioNTech, and a pharmaceutical company from Indonesia, Biofarma.
The development of this vaccine uses mRNA technology and is currently being explored for phase 2 clinical trial locations in Indonesia.
“I believe that with this investment we will not only save lives, but also increase economic growth in the long term,” said Minister of Health Budi.
2024-02-10 15:23:03
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