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HEALTH-VIRUS-VACCINE
German-Chinese coronavirus vaccine trial begins in China
BERLIN, Aug 5, 2020 (BSS/AFP) – Clinical trials on humans have
begun in China for a potential coronavirus vaccine developed by German
pharmaceutical group BioNTech with Chinese company Fosun Pharma, the
companies said Wednesday.
Seventy-two participants have already received their first dose
following approval for the phase 1 trial from Chinese regulatory
authorities, BioNTech and Fosun Pharma said in a statement.
The vaccine candidate, known as BNT162b1, is one of four based on
BioNTech’s proprietary mRNA technology.
Another, BNT162b2, is being evaluated in a global phase 3 trial
conducted by BioNTech and US giant Pfizer which started on July 27.
The phase 1 trial in China involves 144 participants who will
receive two doses 21 days apart.
Those aged 18-55 will be the first to take part, followed by older people.
Laboratories around the world are racing to find a vaccine to curb
COVID-19, which has claimed more than 700,000 lives and upended the
livelihoods of millions.
More than 200 candidate vaccines are currently being developed with
roughly two dozen at the stage of clinical trials with human
volunteers.
Several Chinese companies are at the forefront of the global vaccine
race, while Russia has said it hopes to be the first in the world to
produce a vaccine for the public, with a target date of September.
But the medicines will likely face heightened scrutiny given that
the regulatory systems in both countries are far more opaque than they
are in the West.
On top of the BioNTech/Pfizer candidate, two other Western
coronavirus vaccines are in final phase three trials: one produced by
US biotech firm Moderna and the National Institutes for Health; and
the other by the University of Oxford and Britain’s AstraZeneca.
BSS/AFP/MRU/1849hrs