LAHORE:The University of Health Sciences (UHS) will test an Australian vaccine -- COVAX-19 -- on active coronavirus patients after preliminary data from its phase-I trials on animals showed it is safe for humans and can successfully generate an immune response.

The announcement was made by UHS Vice Chancellor Prof Javed Akram in a media briefing here on Thursday.

Prof Akram said the randomised test of the vaccine would initially be conducted on 50 active Covid-19 patients aged below 60.

“Twenty-five participants will receive two doses of the vaccine three weeks apart, and as many others will be given a placebo (a substance that has no therapeutic effect, used as a control in testing new drugs)”, he said, adding the patients would then have blood tests to measure their protective antibody and T-cell responses induced by the vaccine.

Earlier, addressing a meeting through video-link, the Adelaide’s Flinders University’s Professor Nikolai Petrovsky said COVAX-19 was made from a synthetic protein using a plant sugar, and was based on an earlier SARS-1 coronavirus vaccine that proved effective in animal models.

COVAX-19 to reach Pakistan after two weeks

He said the randomised trial was also being conducted at the Royal Adelaide Hospital, Australia, involving 40 volunteers.

“The subjects have had the vaccine, they’ve had no problems at all, and so that now it allows us to move forward into much bigger studies to confirm the effectiveness of the vaccine,” Prof Petrovsky told the meeting attended by senior UHS faculty.

He said there was a whole lot of different groups in the community that behaved differently,including the elderly, the young children and those with a chronic disease. “So basically we have to include all of these groups [in the trial]”, he added.

Prof Petrovsky further said that COVAX-19 didn’t involve any viruses. “The vaccine is just a protein so it can’t hurt you, and that’s why it’s so safe”.

“‘We insert the gene for the spike protein from Covid-19 into insect cells that are grown in culture and secrete the synthetic protein into the broth in which the cells live. We then purify the protein from the broth to make it extremely pure and then mix it with some plant-based and synthetic sugars to make the vaccine”, he explained

Prof Petrovsky said unlike the virus itself, the vaccine was designed to induce antibodies that “stay around for a long time”.

Prof Akram said a memorandum of understanding (MoU) would be signed between the UHS and Flinders University to test the vaccine on humans.Jinnah Sindh Medical University Karachi would also be part of the agreement, he added.

He further said volunteers for conducting vaccine trial would be enrolled in the next few days, while the vaccine from Australia would reach Pakistan within two weeks.

Prof Akram said that approval would be sought from the National Bioethics Committee, Drug Regulatory Authority of Pakistan and other relevant bodies before the testing began.

He said other universities would also be welcomed to be part of the project.

He said the vaccine would be given to Covid-19 patients in the form of intramuscular injections. In the light of the results of this pilot project, more patients would be vaccinated, he added.

Responding to a question, the UHS VC said that vaccine production on a commercial scale could start in three months.

Prof Javed Akram said smart lockdown, improved immunity and weather conditions could be the major reasons for the decline in virus cases in Pakistan.

He, however, said the month of Muharram would be a major challenge with regards to the control of coronavirus and appealed to the people to exercise caution.

Published in Dawn, August 7th, 2020