Bharat Biotech inks deal with US-based varsity for single dose intranasal COVID vaccine

Leading Indian pharma giant Bharat Biotech on Wednesday anunced it would be manufacturing up to a billion doses of a single-dose intranasal COVID-19 vaccine in collaboration with Washington University School of Medicine in St Louis, United States.

 Hyderabad-headquartered company owns rights to distribute vaccine in all markets except for US, Japan, and Europe, company has said.  agreement is expected to help overcome potential difficulties with distributing vaccine, like high cost of vaccination or a possible short of personnel to administer doses to required population.

While phase one human trials will take place at Treatment Evaluation Unit of Saint Louis University (SLU), also in St Louis, Bharat Biotech is expected to undertake furr sts of clinical trials in India “upon obtaining required regulatory approval”, company said in a release. It will also undertake large-scale manufacturing of vaccine at its facility located in Geme Valley, Hyderabad.

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“We are proud to collaborate on this invative vaccine. We envision that we will scale this vaccine to one billion doses. Individuals can be vaccinated by a single dose regimen. An intranasal vaccine will t only be simple to administer but also reduce use of medical consumables such as needles, syringes, etc, significantly impacting overall cost of a vaccination drive,” said Krishna Ella, chairman and managing director (MD), Bharat Biotech.

He furr said that company's experience in viral vaccines, manufacturing capabilities, and distribution continue to be its strong suit in ensuring safe, efficacious, and affordable vaccines. "It is prudent for Bharat Biotech to be involved in diverse but tenable projects to provide a much-needed vaccine against Covid-19 that reaches all citizens of world."

According to company’s statement, this intranasal vaccine candidate has shown "unprecedented levels" of protection in mice studies; for which techlogy and data have been recently published in scientific journal Cell and in an editorial in Nature, a British weekly scientific journal.

Earlier this month, phase two of human clinical trial of Bharat Biotech's COVAXIN, India’s first indigeusly developed vaccine against COVID-19, began at Post Graduate Institute (PGI) Rohtak. 

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