COVID19: Australia team begins potential vaccine test

The Commonwealth Scientific and Industrial Research Organisation (CSIRO), Australia’s national science agency, has commenced the first stage of testing potential vaccines for Covid-19. The testing, expected to take three months, is under way at the Australian Animal Health Laboratory (AAHL), the organisation’s high-containment biosecurity facility in Geelong.

Last year, CSIRO partnered with the Coalition for Epidemic Preparedness Innovations (CEPI), a global group that aims to derail epidemics by speeding up development of vaccines. In January, CEPI engaged CSIRO to work on countering the virus SARS CoV-2, which causes Covid-19.

In consultation with WHO, CEPI identified vaccine candidates from University of Oxford (UK) and Inovio Pharmaceuticals Inc. (US) for first pre-clinical trials at CSIRO.

TOI was the first to report that a team at CSIRO was the first to grow a batch of the virus outside China in sufficient stocks for pre-clinical studies.

SS Vasan, team leader, CSIRO Dangerous Pathogens Team and principal investigator of CEPI projects, told TOI: “We designed a staggered challenge study to get timely information on vaccine efficacy, initially with just the prime dose, followed closely by prime and boost. With the Oxford candidate, we are exploring if intranasal administration induces tissue resident immunity to help clear the infection more readily or rapidly.”

This milestone builds on CSIRO’s work to tackle the pandemic, which has included scaling up other potential vaccine candidates.

CSIRO is testing vaccine candidates for efficacy and evaluating the best way to give the vaccine for better protection, including an intramuscular injection and innovative approaches like a nasal spray.

Professor Trevor Drew, director of AAHL and leading the organisation’s vaccine work, said: “We have been studying SARS CoV-2 since January and getting ready to test the first vaccine candidates as soon as they are available.”

Marshall said: “In February, we successfully established a biological model, the first in the world, to confirm how ferrets react to SARS-CoV-2. Researchers have progressed to studying the course of infection in animals, a crucial step in understanding if a vaccine will work.”

According to Marshall, CSIRO researchers confirmed that the virus is changing into a number of distinct ‘clusters’ and are now looking at how this may impact on vaccine development.


Source: times of india