The active substance of Oxford / As …

This week local laboratory mAbxience will ship the first batch of active substance from Oxford / AstraZeneca – equivalent to 6 or 7 million doses – in Mexico at the Liomont laboratory to complete the production process: packaging, labeling and distribution throughout the region. This is how the procedure will unfold over the next few months and it will be good to get used to: Argentina will successively send the raw material of the vaccine so that the Latin American neighbor can complete the procedure. From mAbxience they work in advance and make sure they are already through the fourth batch of production. In fact, they estimate, in the short term, achieve a delivery rate approaching 30 million doses per month.

The equation is simple: the local plant must cover what it can pack from Mexico (1 million daily doses). In this context, “it is very likely that our country will have an interesting part of the final production. Of these six million per batch, Argentina should receive at least two million with each delivery. Imagine that we receive 300 thousand from Sputnik and that we are very happy, when the millions of AstraZeneca come, the joy will multiply ”, he remarked to Page 12 a source familiar with the productive kitchen of the vaccine. If so, in late winter and early spring Argentina could have a large portion of its population vaccinated. While the initial agreement provided for the production of 150 million doses, during a recent contract extension, mAbxience would be able to produce an additional 30 million doses., which would reach 180 million.

On August 13, Alberto Fernández broke the news. The AstraZeneca laboratory had signed an agreement with the Slim Foundation of Mexico to produce between 150 and 200 million doses of the vaccine to be distributed throughout Latin America. There, the mAbxience domestic laboratory of the Grupo Insud (belonging to Hugo Sigman) would have a very specific role, since it would be in charge of the manufacture of the active substance which would then go to Mexico to complete its packaging and distribution phases in countries in the region, except Brazil. In the Latin American neighbor, the shares would be carried by the pharmaceutical company Liomont. What the President has formulated as a promise, finally, becomes reality in due course. By this agreement, from March and in the following months Argentina will have access to 22.4 million doses of the vaccine from AstraZeneca and the University of Oxford. It should be noted that the technology received emergency clearance from Angat at the end of December.

The contribution of Slim Foundation (created by the Mexican millionaire with the same last name) is the key as it provides access to more reasonable prices. Unlike other vaccine options which cost between $ 10 and $ 20, the AstraZeneca variant is estimated to cost between $ 3 and $ 4. In this way, it democratizes the conditions of access to a technology as sensitive as a vaccine in the midst of a pandemic. In a scenario of worsening infections and deaths around the world, having more doses quickly is critical because every day that the procedure is delayed more deaths accumulate and could be avoided.

Production in the local laboratory

MAbxience It is the laboratory responsible for the production of the raw material. The plant – rooted in Garín – with the exception of some located in Brazil or Cuba, is unique in the region. It is equipped with innovative technologies and highly qualified staff: 150 people work tirelessly to achieve the work plan outlined in the middle of last year. It is no coincidence that AstraZeneca has decided to delegate production to local laboratories; in fact, it did so in countries that had infrastructure and experience in biotechnology associated with health. The same he did with mAbxience, he agreed with the production plants in Brazil, India and China. By not having its own offices, it found partners in different parts of the world.

How did mAbxience produce the first batch of vaccine? The challenge for the local factory was to scale up the good results that teams at the University of Oxford had verified in the laboratory: that a vaccine based on adenovirus and with the Sars CoV-2 protein could be safe and generate immunity. As specialists working in the healthcare field generally point out, “one thing is the laboratory test and another very different is what happens when the serialized production process begins.” They are two worlds with completely different logics.

The first step he was growing chimpanzee cells, received directly from the University of Oxford. They did it in large volumes, until – over time – they could achieve the first big goal: transfer this substance into two bioreactors of 2 thousand liters each. There, growth has become mechanical inside devices that mix, aerate, gas and provide the appropriate temperature at the inlet. Why was so much cell medium needed? Because they are parasites, viruses require cells to reproduce. The next step injected them with the adenovirus modified with the coronavirus S protein that started to grow inside of them. After the pathogen infected the cells a lot, it resulted in a lot of viruses. Then they added substances capable of “breaking down” the infected cells and any virus that remained inside the cell. it has been filtered. In this way, the cellular remains were preserved, while they obtained the drug, a fundamental contribution of the vaccine. In the biotechnological field, it is called “raw virus”; that finally then has been purified. It was concentrated, split, frozen and prepared for its trip to Mexico.

It should be noted that the raw material will travel in custody because, although in the minority, there is no shortage of anti-vaccine groups which can endanger the arrival at destination of the drug and, in fact, public health. Once there the first batch, Liomont will thaw it, dilute it (since Argentina leaves very concentrated), will pack it in vials (bottles) sterile, label it and distribute it in the region starting in March. From the Mexican laboratory, they announced that, thanks to their machines and installed capacities, they are in conditions of produce a million daily doses. In Argentina, although there are bottling plants, they do not operate on a Mexican scale. The objective is that the production started in November be oiled and become automatic.

The characteristics of the vaccine

It is based on a adenovirus –A pathogen that commonly infects chimpanzees– and has been genetically engineered to have the ability to express the Spike (S) protein from Sars CoV-2 as an inactivated viral vector. Once inoculated, it produces the protein and the body – by not recognizing it as its own – generates defenses which will then protect the individual against future infections. Thanks to the fact that the adenovirus also intervened, is unable to replicate in the body. Therefore, it has an adequate safety profile and does not cause collateral damage with a few exceptions.

More precisely, although the drug is sufficiently assimilated to the coronavirus, it does not present any danger for people who, on the contrary, deploy the body’s defenses (not only antibodies but also T lymphocytes), which neutralize and then eliminate the infected cells. that is how generates a very strong immune memory. The scheme – like the vast majority of ongoing and already being distributed vaccine platforms – provides for two doses as this increases the level of antibodies generated. The efficiency achieved by the AstraZeneca variant reaches around 70%, a considerable percentage if you take into account that the influenza vaccine that Argentines apply each year is about 60%. Lastly, from AstraZeneca, they announced the completion of additional clinical trials with the aim of increasing this percentage in the coming months.

To the 300,000 doses of Sputnik that arrived on Saturday, the others will complete the 20 million, the million of the Chinese vaccine manufactured by the state-owned Sinopharm, the 22.4 million of AstraZeneca / Oxford which will arrive in March and the 9 million which will be received from the Covax platform, the global access fund which is led by the World Health Organization and whose creation endorsement has been signed by 172 countries. Finally, the government does not rule out resolving the misunderstandings with Pfizer or concluding, in the coming days, an agreement for the arrival of Moderna.