E-DRUG: PQMD Webinars on Covid-19 Vaccines
--------------------------------------------
E-Druggers,
On Wednesday I watched two excellent webinars sponsored by the Partnership for Quality Medical Donations (PQMD) about Covid-19 vaccines. What I found refreshing is that the people speaking were all experts in their own rights and spoke about the realities being faced in the effort to develop vaccines.
The PQMD Webinars were recorded and are on the web.
They have been posted at
https://youtu.be/67aVc3ftjyE
The URL for the page on which the link appears is http://www.pqmd.org/pillars/pillar-talks/
The first webinar included the following participants.
1. Arnaud Bernaert Head of Health And Healthcare, Member Of The Executive Committee, World Economic Forum. He reported that previously the worlds production of vaccines amounted to 3.5 billion doses and that 2.5 billion doses had already been purchased in advance by high income countries for when the first vaccines are registered. He also pointed out that when they are registered no one can know how long the vaccine will be effective.
2. Sophie Mathewson, Specialist, Vaccine Policy & Investment, GAVI: The Vaccine Alliance. She talked about a number of practical issues they are facing and discussed the effect of Covid on existing highly effective existing programs have been affected and then issue of vaccine hesitancy.
3. Dawn O'Connell, USA Director, Coalition for Epidemic Preparedness Innovations (CEPI). This is the relatively new organization that was created to promote research into vaccines.
4. Dr. Tolullah Oni, Clinical Senior Research Associate, MRC Epidemiology Unit, University of Cambridge Although she spoke last, she was very interesting. She is a clinical epidemiologist who has worked in South Africa on TB vaccine trial but clearly knows a lot about a lot of different things.
One comment she made which was not discussed as the panel ran out of time was "What will an effective Covid vaccine do? Will it reduce mortality? Will it prevent transmission? Will it do both or just one of these functions?" Thinking about her question, you can imagine that a vaccine that prevents mortality will be popular with the general public but if it does not prevent transmission governments may be much less willing to purchase it. If it only prevents transmission will the general public be willing to take it? Interesting questions.
The second panel had three participants, two from big pharma industry and the third from a Brazilian government supported institution with a lot of experience in bring vaccines to market.
1. Dr. Isabelle Deschamps, Head of Global Vaccines and Public Affairs, Sanofi Pasteur She explained how Sanofi and GSK have formed a consortium that will build on the two different companies expertise in developing vaccine antigens and adjuvants and will jointly produce vaccines that may be better than the first round vaccines that are currently in Phase 3 trials.
2. Prof. Raul Machado Neto, Director of Institutional Strategy, Instituto Butantan. He talked about how institutions like his in Latin America were open to establish partnerships with big pharma companies based on mutual respect and trust. Clearly he has had a lot of positive and negative experiences.
3. Dr. Julia Spencer, Associate Vice President, Global Vaccines Public Policy, Partnerships, & Government Affairs at Merck. She talked about the importance of ensuring that any vaccine that was produced should be safe, of assured quality and efficacious. I got the strong impression from the industry speakers that they would not be seeking any Emergency Use Authorizations as has happened with chloroquine and convalescent plasma.
There was some discussion about financing and pricing and the case was made that companies needed these Advance Market Commitment payments to do the research now and that if they did not agree to these pre-registration contacts they would not be able to get the work done.
I was worried that when the vaccines do come out especially if a number of the initial Phase 3 trials fail will there not be any vaccine left for high risk individuals in LMICs. I think they may have a long wait.
I would encourage E-Druggers to view these recorded webinars. I learned a lot and was impressed with the speakers.
Richard
Richard Laing
Retired Professor, Department of Global Health
Boston University School of Public Health,
E mail richardl@bu.edu