Vaccine trials may start this month — DOST

MANILA, Philippines — The World Health Organization (WHO) Solidarity Trials for candidate vaccines against COVID-19 and clinical trials of the Sputnik V candidate vaccine developed by Russia’s Gamaleya Institute could start this month.

Although the WHO list of potential vaccines has not been finalized yet, Rowena Cristina Guevara, science undersecretary for research and development, said it is still possible that the clinical trials of both could start within the month.

The WHO Solidarity Trials committee or secretariat, she noted, is still finalizing the list of vaccines and clinical trial protocol.

She also said that the confidential data agreements (CDAs) entered into by the Philippine government with six institutions and pharmaceutical companies – Adimmune of Taiwan; Seqirus of Australia; Russia’s Gamaleya Institute; Sinovac, Sinopharm and Anhui Zhifei, all from China – will pave the way for the conduct of local clinical trials for their respective candidate COVID-19 vaccines.

All six are included in the WHO list, added Guevara, who is also chair of the Inter-Agency Task Force for the Management of Emerging Infectious Diseases (IATF) sub-technical working group on international collaborations on COVID-19 vaccine development.

“There are so many candidate vaccines. At this point in time, the WHO vaccine landscape still includes all six,” she shared.

The Department of Science and Technology (DOST) has allocated P89.1 million for participation in the WHO Solidarity Trials for vaccines against COVID-19.

Science Secretary Fortunato dela Peña earlier gave assurance that the department was ready to increase the budget allocation for the program if the fund would be inadequate.

The fund, Dela Peña said, might not be enough if the WHO will include a large number of candidate vaccines in the clinical trials.

Meanwhile, Guevarra said the Philippines has signed a CDA with another potential partner for a vaccine against the novel coronavirus – Anhui Zhifei of China.

This brings to six the Philippines’ potential collaborators for the conduct of clinical trials for a candidate COVID-19 vaccine and even the local production of a selected vaccine in view of the DOST’s thrust to sign a licensing agreement and a local production deal with a prospective vaccine supply partner.

Guevara said they are still talking to other companies or institutes that have ongoing COVID-19 vaccine development projects.

“We are still open,” she told The STAR.

On top of direct talks with the individual entities and pharmaceutical firms developing their respective candidate COVID-19 vaccines, the DOST and IATF were also continuously coordinating with the WHO for the Philippines’ participation in the solidarity trials.