Covid-19 vaccines targeting several variants are underway at Moderna, Novavax

The paper is part of a series of efforts that vaccine manufacturers and drug researchers are committed to overcoming variants such as those identified in the United Kingdom, South Africa and Brazil.

Research shows that some vaccines currently used generate weaker immune responses against the strain found in South Africa, in particular, although there is no evidence that current vaccines do not protect against variants.

To be safe, companies are exploring to strengthen the protection afforded by existing photos by adding doses, updating photos or making a reminder. A multivalent photograph is another approach at work.

Testing of multivalent candidates in humans has not yet begun. Some companies hope to start spring so that photos can be available for use in the summer.

Health experts say wide-ranging shooting could make a difference in the fight against the pandemic by preventing coronavirus mutations that could help prevent existing vaccines before the population’s widespread immunity is achieved.

“If there are two or three predominant strains worldwide and one infection or immunity does not protect against the other, then we may need multivalent vaccines,” said Buddy Creech, director of the vaccine research program at Vanderbilt University.

Multivalent vaccines are a widely used weapon against other viruses, such as measles, mumps and rubella. Some pneumonia vaccines target up to 23 strains, while most flu vaccines target four different flu strains.

To beat a variety of variants, vaccines are essentially mixed with a series of different photos. As long as researchers choose the right combinations, vaccines should work, though not if the mixture spreads the protection too thin, vaccine experts say.

Multivalent vaccines would be especially useful against Covid-19, say virologists and vaccine experts, if scientists are able to predict what mutations could spread, as is done with the flu each year.

“The real question is what the virus will evolve into, and if we knew the answer to that, then we could stop it,” said Dr. Sean Whelan, a virologist at Washington University in St. Louis. Louis, whose lab he’s trying to predict. important mutations.

Companies have been looking at Covid-19 multivalent vaccines in recent months as research has suggested that emerging variants could escape the protection of currently available vaccines.

Companies may prefer to make Covid-19 multivalent vaccines, rather than tailoring photos to different regions of the world.

However, multivalent vaccines are more complex to research and manufacture, which can increase the company’s costs and time to make them, vaccine experts say.

The global Covid-19 vaccine market would be worth more than $ 15 billion if annual vaccinations were needed to address declining protection over time, and multivalent vaccines were needed to remove the variants, Bernstein Research estimates.

Moderna, which is developing a vaccine that specifically targets the strain identified in South Africa, is also looking for a candidate to combine the variant-focused vaccine with the company’s vaccine currently in use.

The combination “could ultimately be the best approach,” Moderna President Stephen Hoge said in a earnings call last month. Moderna did not specify when she would start a study for the multivalent candidate.

Novavax, which has a Covid-19 vaccine targeting the original version of the virus in late US testing, plans to begin testing a bivalent vaccine targeting the original version in the middle of the year, as well as the first-identified variant in Africa. South, Dr. Gregory Glenn, the company’s head of R&D, said in a conference call this month.

It settled on this approach after analyzing data from its clinical trials in the UK, indicating that targeting the South African variant would provide protection against other strains, a Novavax spokeswoman said.

Researchers at Oxford University are pursuing a multivalent approach that includes targeting strains first identified in Brazil and South Africa, according to AstraZeneca AZN 1.37%

PLC, which granted the license for distribution.

Trials could begin this spring, given the summer, said Dr. Mene Pangalos, an AstraZeneca R&D director, in a conference call with analysts last month.

Drew Weissman, immunologist at the University of Pennsylvania, whose research has contributed to the mRNA technology used by BioNTech SE BNTX 2.92%

and Moderna, said its team is working on a multivalent vaccine to cover all current and future variants.

“No one wants to be in a position where a variant suddenly infects everyone again, so people want to have the vaccines ready to go. I did not reach this point. So we have time to do this well, “he said in an interview.

Johnson & Johnson JNJ 1.18%

He said he was preparing an antigen – the substance on which a vaccine is based to generate an immune response – that would target a variant that has spread to South Africa.

The company, which has a newly licensed Covid-19 vaccine, has not committed to a multivalent vaccine, but would develop one if a variant would get rid of the vaccine protection.

Pfizer Inc.,

FE 0.87%

who developed with the partner BioNTech the first Covid-19 vaccine authorized in the USA, is only working on a vaccine targeting the South African version. Pfizer believes it is enough to target only one strain because it eliminates other variants, so there is no need for a multivalent vaccine that attacks multiple strains, said Phil Dormitzer, the scientific head of the drug’s viral vaccines.

However, Dr. Ofer Levy, director of the vaccination program at Boston Children’s Hospital, said several variants can circulate simultaneously until one becomes the dominant strain.

Write to Jared S. Hopkins at [email protected]