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Community => Recreation Commons => Our researchers have made a breakthrough! => Topic started by: Buster's Uncle on August 12, 2014, 12:27:18 am

Title: Factbox: Developers of potential Ebola vaccines and treatments
Post by: Buster's Uncle on August 12, 2014, 12:27:18 am

Factbox: Developers of potential Ebola vaccines and treatments
Reuters
4 hours ago



(Reuters) - Several companies with potential Ebola vaccines and treatments have captured the spotlight, as developers face mounting pressure to expedite research on new medical interventions.

The Ebola epidemic in West Africa has killed nearly 1,000 people and prompted the World Health Organization to declare an international health emergency.

No Ebola drugs or vaccines have entered mid-stage human trials, let alone been approved. The most advanced have been tested only in monkeys and a handful of humans.


VACCINES


GLAXOSMITHKLINE PLC

GSK is co-developing a vaccine with the U.S. National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases (NIAID), which has shown promising results in primates.

The vaccine is due to enter early-stage human trials, pending U.S. Food and Drug Administration approval. GSK has said human testing should start this year. NIAID expects trials to begin "as early as fall 2014."

Even if it is fast-tracked and works as well as hoped, the new vaccine could not be ready for widespread deployment before 2015.


JOHNSON & JOHNSON

The company's Crucell unit is working with the U.S. NIAID to develop a vaccine, which should enter early-stage clinical testing in late-2015 or early-2016. The Crucell vaccine is designed to give additional protection against Marburg, another severe and highly fatal disease caused by a virus from the same family as Ebola.


BAVARIAN NORDIC A/S

The Danish company is developing its smallpox vaccine, Imvanex, for use as an anti-filovirus injection. The drug was found to be 100 percent protective against Ebola and Marburg in non-human primates.

The U.S. government awarded the company a $17.9 million contract in 2012. The injectable form of Imvanex is likely to enter Phase I clinical trials in the United States in 2015, Maxim analyst Jason Kolbert said.


PROFECTUS BIOSCIENCES INC

The privately owned company has tested its vaccine in monkeys, with good results. A single intramuscular injection was found to protect all of the rhesus monkeys exposed to Ebola three weeks later. The company hopes to launch a human trial within 12 months.


TREATMENTS


TEKMIRA PHARMACEUTICALS CORP

The FDA has allowed the Canadian drugmaker to resume testing a drug in people infected with Ebola, after blocking human tests last month. The FDA had halted the early-stage study following safety concerns among people taking the highest doses of the drug.


BIOCRYST PHARMACEUTICALS INC

The company's BCX4430 drug is in pre-clinical trials to treat Marburg, and analysts believe it could potentially cure Ebola.

SIGA TECHNOLOGIES INC

The bio-defense drug developer's experimental drug, ST-383, aims to prevent the Ebola virus from entering host cells, effectively ending its replication cycle, Kolbert said in a note. The company says the drug is being tested on animals.


MEDIVECTOR

The privately held drugmaker, along with its Japanese partner, Fujifilm Holdings Corp, is in talks with the FDA to submit an application to expand the use of its influenza drug, Favipiravir, as a treatment for Ebola.


SAREPTA THERAPEUTICS INC

Sarepta has undertaken some human trials on its anti-Ebola drug, but lost government funding two years ago.


MAPP BIOPHARMACEUTICAL INC

The California-based privately owned company shot into the limelight when its anti-Ebola drug was given to two Ebola-infected U.S. aid workers, who have since shown signs of improvement. However, so far it has only been tested in monkeys. Mapp was part of a consortium of 15 research outfits that in March won a five-year grant from the National Institutes of Health worth up to $28 million to find a treatment for Ebola.


NANOVIRICIDES INC

The company said last week it would resume development of its anti-Ebola drug.

(Reporting by Natalie Grover in Bangalore)


http://news.yahoo.com/factbox-developers-potential-ebola-vaccines-treatments-183203894--finance.html (http://news.yahoo.com/factbox-developers-potential-ebola-vaccines-treatments-183203894--finance.html)

Title: Clinical trial to start soon on GSK Ebola vaccine
Post by: Buster's Uncle on August 12, 2014, 12:32:08 am

Clinical trial to start soon on GSK Ebola vaccine
Reuters
By Ben Hirschler  August 10, 2014 11:38 AM


(http://l3.yimg.com/bt/api/res/1.2/EMrjD70.oGjedQKxxOiJGQ--/YXBwaWQ9eW5ld3M7Zmk9ZmlsbDtoPTMwMDtweW9mZj0wO3E9NzU7dz00NTA-/http://media.zenfs.com/en_us/News/Reuters/2014-08-10T153842Z_1_LYNXMPEA7909P_RTROPTP_2_HEALTH-EBOLA-AFRICA.JPG)
Medical staff working with Medecins sans Frontieres (MSF) prepare to bring food to patients kept in an isolation area at the MSF Ebola treatment centre in Kailahun July 20, 2014. REUTERS/Tommy Trenchard


LONDON (Reuters) - A clinical trial of an experimental vaccine against the deadly Ebola virus is set to start shortly, according to British drugmaker GlaxoSmithKline, which is co-developing the product with U.S. scientists.

The world's worst outbreak of Ebola has killed nearly 1,000 people in West Africa and the disease could continue spreading for months, increasing pressure on researchers to accelerate their work on new medical interventions.

There is no proven cure or vaccine to prevent infection with Ebola and the scale of the current outbreak has prompted the World Health Organisation to declare it an international health emergency.

GSK's experimental vaccine has already produced promising results in animal studies involving primates and it is now due to enter initial Phase I testing in humans, pending approval from the U.S. Food and Drug Administration.

A company spokeswoman said on Sunday that the trial should get underway "later this year", while GSK's partner the U.S. National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases (NIAID) said in a statement on its website it would start "as early as fall 2014", implying a potential September launch of testing.

Even if is fast-tracked, however, and emergency procedures are put in place, the new vaccine could not be ready for widespread deployment before 2015 - even assuming it works as well as hoped.

"It is right at the beginning of the development journey and still has a very long way to go," the GSK official said, declining to be drawn on a possible timeline for launch.

The investigational vaccine is based on a chimpanzee adenovirus into which two Ebola genes have been inserted, which means it contains no infectious Ebola virus material. Adenoviruses are best known for causing the common cold.

Once the vaccine enters a cell and delivers its genetic payload, the two gene inserts produce a protein that generates an immune response in the body - but the adenovirus carrying the genes does not replicate further.

GSK acquired the vaccine after buying Swiss-based biotech company Okairos for 250 million euros ($335 million) last year.

The U.S. NIAID - part of the National Institutes of Health - is also supporting work on other early-stage Ebola vaccines, including one from Johnson & Johnson's Crucell unit that should enter Phase I clinical testing in late 2015 or early 2016.

The Crucell vaccine is designed to give additional protection against Marburg, another severe and highly fatal disease caused by a virus from the same family as Ebola. ($1 = 0.7458 Euros)

(Editing by Keiron Henderson)


http://news.yahoo.com/clinical-trial-start-soon-gsk-ebola-vaccine-153842584--finance.html (http://news.yahoo.com/clinical-trial-start-soon-gsk-ebola-vaccine-153842584--finance.html)