Coronavirus: the Institut Pasteur halts its main vaccine project, not effective enough

"On Monday, the Institut Pasteur put an end to the development of its main Covid-19 vaccine project. The first trials of this vaccine, developed in partnership with the Merck group (MSD), showed that it was less effective than hoped."

"In its press release, the American pharmaceutical group confirms that it is halting the development of the two vaccines it was working on, saying it wants to give priority to research into treatments for the disease."

"Results below those of vaccines already on the market"

"The two vaccines, V591, acquired with the takeover of the Austrian company Themis Bioscience, and V590, developed with the non-profit organisation IAVI, generated in the first trials immune responses lower than those observed in people who had recovered from the coronavirus, and lower than those announced for other vaccines, the laboratory explains."

"The project under way with Pasteur used the measles vaccine as a base, adapted to fight Covid-19. Phase 1 trials (the first stage of human trials) had begun last August. Pasteur specified that it was continuing its work on other coronavirus vaccine projects, but that these were still at a preliminary stage."

"Other projects still at an early stage"

""The first, which can be administered nasally, is being developed with the biotechnology company TheraVectys, a spin-off of the Institut Pasteur specialising in the development of vaccines. The second is a DNA vaccine candidate," Pasteur said."

"These two projects "are currently in the preclinical phase", which means that no trials have yet been carried out on humans. "It must be borne in mind that vaccine research is very difficult. One can never be sure that the data obtained in animals will be obtained in humans," commented Odile Launay, infectious disease specialist and member of the COVID-19 vaccine committee, on franceinfo on Monday.
"Messenger RNA vaccines have produced absolutely exceptional results, so we are no longer in the situation where we had zero vaccines. Today, we have several messenger RNA vaccines and we have a reference vaccine that we must be able to match before continuing research.""

"Merck, for its part, will focus its efforts on the research and production of two experimental drugs, MK-7110 and MK-4482, an orally administered antiviral that it now calls molnupiravir. Merck says it hopes to have the first clinical trial results for MK-7110 by the end of March at the latest."

"Another French player, the Sanofi laboratory, had announced in December that its vaccine had fallen
behind schedule and would not be ready until the end of 2021, because of results that were not as good as expected."

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https://www.francebleu.fr

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