10 probable Covid-19 vaccines by mid-2021, according to the head of the global pharmaceutical group

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Up to 10 coronavirus vaccines could be available by mid-2021 if they get regulatory approval, but their inventors need patent protection, the head of the global industry group said pharmaceutical.

The Covid-19 vaccines from US pharmaceutical giant Pfizer and its German partner BioNtech, as well as Moderna and AstraZeneca have shown promising results in large clinical trials, but there is no question of “cutting corners”, said Thomas Cueni, Director General of the International Federation of Pharmaceutical Manufacturers and Associations (IFPMA).

“So far, 3 of us 3 out of 3 were successful. I would expect us to see something similar with Johnson & Johnson, I would expect to see similar positive results with Novavax, well others, Sanofi Pasteur, GSK are in there, Merck, “news agency Reuters Cueni quoted as saying.

On the stimulation of manufacturing

Large pharmaceutical and biotech companies have invested heavily in research and development and boosting manufacturing during the pandemic so they can deploy vaccine doses, Cueni said at a press briefing in Geneva.

It would be a mistake to lift patent protection to allow compulsory licenses and to try to manufacture vaccines that require such complex quality assurance without specialized personnel and quality control procedures, he said.

“We hope that by next summer we will probably have 10 vaccines that have proven their worth. But all of them really need to come through rigorous scientific scrutiny by regulators.”

At the World Trade Organization (WTO), India and South Africa have proposed allowing a temporary waiver to allow compulsory licenses for patented products during the pandemic. The United States, the European Union, Switzerland and others have rejected it, trade officials say.

Cueni, when asked about the proposal, said: “For me, this questioning of intellectual property is really primarily political, but it is politics that is not useful because it would send very negative signals in terms of disrespectful of the system that allowed the world to respond so quickly. and so responsible. “

“ Businesses would not exploit the pandemic ”

Vaccine manufacturing factories often need 50 quality assurance agents performing hundreds of checks during production, he said, stressing that companies would not profit from the pandemic.

Cueni said IFPMA records showed that there had never been a compulsory license granted for a vaccine and pointed to the difficult technology and know-how. Almost all of the member companies had committed to “non-profit” or socially responsible prices during the pandemic, he added.

Meanwhile, a panel of U.S. advisers will meet soon to vote on the scarcity of initial supplies of a COVID-19 vaccine once a vaccine has been approved.

The experts suggested giving the vaccine to health workers first. High priority can also be given to workers in essential industries, people with certain medical conditions, and people aged 65 and over.