On Thursday, September 3, the French laboratory Sanofi launched the human clinical trial for the candidate vaccine against Covid-19. Developed with the British GSK, the vaccine is, for the moment, in phase 1 and 2 of clinical trials. Update on the situation. 

 

On Thursday, September 3, the Sanofi laboratory launched the human clinical trial for the new coronavirus vaccine candidate. In a press release dedicated to the launch of these clinical trials, Thomas Triomphe, Executive Vice President of Sanofi Pasteur, states that it is “ an important step and one more step towards the development of a potential vaccine to help us defeat the Covid-19 ». 

 

 

The long-awaited vaccine will be manufactured in Vitry-sur-Seine, in Val-de-Marne. The labs plan to recruit 440 healthy participants to test the vaccine candidate, which relies on the recombinant protein technology that Sanofi uses for one of these seasonal influenza vaccines as well as a pandemic adjuvant developed by GSK. If the data of the study are positive, this could allow moving to phase 3, the last step before a possible marketing. The laboratories hope to be able to apply for licensing and regulatory approval in the first half of 2021. 

 

Sanofi and GSK have already increased their production capacities with a view to being able to manufacture nearly a billion doses in 2021. As regards distribution, it is already agreed that 60 million doses of the candidate vaccine are reserved for the British government, 300 million for the European Commission, 100 million for the United States (with an option to 500 million in the long term). In all cases, the president of Sanofi France, Olivier Bogillot, assured that “ the French and Europeans will have the Sanofi vaccine at the same time as the American patients ». 

 

In an interview given on Saturday September 5, 2020 on France Inter, Olivier Bogillot indicated that the vaccine would be available for less than 10 euros. The price announced for the vaccine developed by the Anglo-Swedish AstraZeneca, is estimated at 2,50 euros per dose. Why such a price difference? Olivier Bogillot explains that these are different methods. Sanofi uses its “ own researchers and own factories To develop and produce the vaccine, while the competitor further subcontracts its production.