Multinational pharmaceuticals titan, GSK (LON:GSK) have told the market that they have teamed up with Clover Biopharmaceuticals are to collaborate on a coronavirus vaccine.
Shares in GSK trade at 1,631p (-1.63%). 24/2/20 12:40BST.
Writing at this moment – it seems that the coronavirus has been around for months, however in the few weeks that it has dominated news headlines, the number of incidents have been rising.
Clover said that they have entered a research collaboration deal with GSK for Clover’s “protein-based coronavirus vaccine candidate” known as COVID-19 S-Trimer.
“We are proud to contribute to cutting edge research from scientists at Clover Biopharmaceuticals in China as part of our strategy to make our adjuvant technology available to selected partners who have a promising vaccine candidate against the newly emerged coronavirus.” said Thomas Breuer, Chief Medical Officer of GlaxoSmithKline Vaccines.
“The use of an adjuvant is of particular importance in a pandemic situation since it may reduce the amount of vaccine protein required per dose, allowing more vaccine doses to be produced and therefore contributing to protect more people.”
The public sector are still adjusting their response and approach to the outbreak of the coronavirus – however the input from the private sector has been positive.
Despite the number of affected individuals decreasing by the day, the larger issue still needs to be addressed.
The collaboration deal between Clover and GSK will hopefully bring about a positive vaccine which can be deployed with effective use to combat the coronavirus spread.
“At Clover we look forward to evaluating the combination of GSK’s pandemic adjuvant system and our S-Trimer as a vaccine candidate. Utilizing our proprietary Timer-Tag© technology that has been shown to be recognized by antibodies produced by multiple previously-infected coronavirus patients, S-Trimer is being rapidly developed to support global efforts in combating this current and any future coronavirus outbreaks,” said Joshua Liang, Chief Strategy Officer and Board Director at Clover
“We are proud to work with GSK, and we are encouraged by the progress of our S-Trimer vaccine program,” said Steven Gong, VP Business Development & Strategy at Clover. “To this end, we recognize that collaborations will be critical to accelerating the development of a successful new vaccine in times of emergency, and we continue to invite any interested regulatory, academic or industry parties to contact us for this noble common cause.”
