Recently, the number of COVID-19 cases confirmed worldwide has exceeded 28million. As of September 11th, more than 290,000 confirmed cases have been reported around the world. Vaccines are becoming more critical as COVID-19 spreads rapidly. Vaccines are being studied continuously around the world. Which company is at the forefront of vaccine development?
First of all, there is Pfizer, an American pharmaceutical company, and BioNTech, a Germany biotech company. The two companies are jointly studying vaccines. Their most promising vaccine is based on mRNA, named BNT162. Currently, the phase 2 and 3 clinical studies are being conducted at the same time. Pfizer was the first to conduct phase 3 trials.
Next is Moderna, an American biotechnology company. Like Pfizer, they focused on a vaccine based on RNA, and the name is mRNA-1273. The study began on January 13, completed the phase 1 test on April 16, the phase 2 test on July 8, and recently began the phase 3 study on July 27.
Then, how about Korean vaccines? Currently, a total of two vaccines have entered phase 3 in Korea, with Genexine being the only Korean company to enter the third phase.
Genexine is a company specializing in antibody-based treatment and vaccine development. Genexine made a development agreement with Y-Biologics and the Vaccine Institute in Thailand. Their vaccine development product, GX-19, has developed a corona-preventive DNA vaccine, and the company started a clinical 1/2a phase on June 11.
There is also the International Vaccine Institute (IVI), an international non-profit organization that includes South Korea, Sweden, and others, headquartered in Seoul. A clinical study of the vaccine INO-4800 started in Korea with GX-19 on July 2, and safety, drug resistance, and immunity assessments are in progress.
In addition to cases mentioned above, phase 3 trials were also started by Astrozeneca in England, Sinobaek in China, Sinoparm, and Kansino. It is good to succeed in developing vaccines first. However, the most important thing is to examine whether the vaccine has any harmful effects and whether it works better than conventional vaccines.
