GSK has announced that Clover Biopharmaceuticals initiated the Phase 1 trial of COVID-19 vaccine SCB-2019. The vaccine was given in combination with the GSK pandemic adjuvant.
GSK has made a scientific collaboration with Chinese company Clover Pharmaceuticals to develop the COVID-19 vaccine.
The company, in its statement, announced that the vaccine product had demonstrated beneficial effects with high neutralizing antibody levels in animals.
The results of the Phase 1 study are expected to be announced in August 2020. The study is being conducted at the Linear Clinical Research in Perth, Australia. The trial included 90 healthy adults. The trial is also funded by Coalition for Epidemic Preparedness Innovations (CEPI). Both companies are planning to initiate a global Phase 2b/3 clinical trial in the latter part of the year.
GSK claimed that using the adjuvant enables less protein required, allowing more vaccines to be produced.
“Our deliberate approach is to combine our proven pandemic adjuvant technology with protein-based COVID-19 vaccine candidates from several collaborators. We believe this holds the promise to produce vaccines at scale, potentially benefiting billions of people.” Said Thomas Breuer, Chief Medical Officer, GSK Vaccines.
GSK has collaborated with Sanofi to develop the vaccine for COVID-19. In that collaboration, Sanofi will contribute to S-protein COVID-19 antigen, and GSK will contribute pandemic adjuvant technology. GSK claimed that the use of adjuvant technology enables less protein required, allowing more vaccine output.
Clover Biopharmaceuticals is a China-based biotechnology company. The company focused on developing products for oncology, autoimmune diseases, and viral vaccines.