17 May 2021
10:03
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French pharmaceutical giant Sanofi and British GSK reported positive results for their lead corona vaccine candidate on Monday, after a few months delay due to a setback.
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Sanofi and GSK have teamed up to create a corona vaccine. The first results were disappointing in December 2020, but now the companies are coming with good news. A phase 2 study with 722 volunteers showed good results in all age groups and resulted in a high immune response in patients with a previous infection after a single dose. In the coming weeks, a phase 3 study will start, a large-scale study of more than 35,000 people that tests for safety.
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Finetunen
Late last year, Sanofi and GSK – two of the largest and most experienced vaccine players in the pharma world – had to update their vaccines after tests showed that the vaccine did not work sufficiently in the elderly: the immune response was too limited. Since the older population is a critical target group, the pharmaceutical companies had to redo some of the work and adapt the vaccine by ‘fine-tuning the concentration of the antigen’.
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Now 90 percent of Belgian over-65s have already received their first injection, Sanofi-GSK appears to be late with its revised vaccine. Yet its usefulness should not be underestimated. The study participants showed a similar antibody response to those recovered from the coronavirus. The people who had already been effectively infected had a particularly high immune response after one dose. That suggests the Sanofi / GSK vaccine could be a good candidate for a booster vaccine.
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If the phase 3 study also turns positive, the vaccine is expected to be approved in the fourth quarter of 2021.
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Third shot
For example, the timing of Sanofi-GSK is not unfortunate, because if the phase 3 study also turns out positive, the vaccine is expected to be approved in the fourth quarter of 2021. That study will also specifically investigate whether the vaccine works against virus variants, such as the South African.
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