The head of Germany’s vaccines regulator said some groups of people living in Germany could be vaccinated early next year against the coronavirus that has killed hundreds of thousands and wreaked havoc on the global economy.
More than half a dozen drugmakers around the world are conducting advanced clinical trials, each with tens of thousands of participants, and several expect to know if their COVID-19 vaccines work and are safe by the end of this year.
Klaus Cichutek, head of the Paul Ehrlich Institut, told the Funke group of newspapers that data from Phase I and Phase II trials showed some vaccines triggered an immune response against the coronavirus.
“If data from Phase III trials shows the vaccines are effective and safe, the first vaccines could be approved at the beginning of the year, possibly with conditions attached,” he said.
“Based on assurances from manufacturers, the first doses for people in Germany will be available at that time, in accordance with the priorities set by the Standing Committee on Vaccination,” Cichutek said, referring to the group that makes recommendations for the use of licensed vaccines in Germany.
The coronavirus has infected more than 22 million people worldwide since first being detected in China late last year. Almost 800,000 have died.
Several companies, including Moderna, AstraZeneca , and Pfizer Inc, say they each expect to make more than 1 billion doses of a vaccine next year.
German biotechnology firm CureVac has not ruled out a speedy approval process for its prospective vaccine and expects to have it on the market by mid-2021.
Last week, Russian President Vladimir Putin said Russia had become the first country to grant regulatory approval to a COVID-19 vaccine after less than two months of human testing. Russia has said the vaccine will be rolled out by the end of this month.
Australia has signed a deal with British drugmaker AstraZeneca to produce and distribute enough doses of a potential coronavirus vaccine for its population of 25 million, Prime Minister Scott Morrison said late on Tuesday.
“Should we be in a position for the trials to be successful, we would hope that this would be made available early next year. If it can be done sooner than that, great,” Morrison said on Wednesday.
All Australians will be offered doses but a medical panel will determine the priority list of vaccine recipients.
“Naturally you would be focusing on the most vulnerable, the elderly, health workers, people with disabilities in terms of the speed of roll out,” Health Minister Greg Hunt told Sky News.
Health authorities would also have to take into account where the highest risk of transmission is and how the vaccine works in different age groups when deciding who should get it first, Victoria’s chief health officer Brett Sutton said.
“If it does work and it’s 80 to 90% effective, then absolutely it will be a game changer,” Sutton said, although he cautioned that broad testing was still at a preliminary stage. “So we shouldn’t hang our hats on a single vaccine.”
AstraZeneca last month said good data was coming in so far on its vaccine for COVID-19, already in large-scale human trials and widely seen as the front-runner in the race for a shot against the novel coronavirus.
The vaccine, called AZD1222, was developed by Britain’s University of Oxford and licensed to AstraZeneca.
Morrison said Australia was also looking for other vaccine deals, including with the University of Queensland and its partner, Australian firm CSL Ltd.
CSL estimates first doses of the University of Queensland vaccine will be available for emergency use by the middle of 2021, Chief Executive Paul Perrault told reporters on Wednesday.
CSL said its first priority would be manufacturing the UQ vaccine, but it was also in talks to help AstraZeneca manufacture its vaccine.
Morrison said Australia is also talking to its Pacific neighbours, including Indonesia, Papua New Guinea and Fiji, about supplying vaccine.
A flare-up in infections in Australia’s second most populous state of Victoria forced authorities two weeks ago to impose a nightly curfew and shut large parts of the state’s economy.
The state has seen a slowdown in new cases in recent days, allaying fears of a nationwide second wave. There were 12 deaths and 216 new infections in the past 24 hours, down from daily increases of more than 700 two weeks ago.
Despite the surge in the past month, Australia has avoided the high casualties of other nations with just under 24,000 infections and 450 deaths from the virus.
REUTERS