May 29, 2020
Bulletin interne de l'Institut Pasteur
MV-SARS-CoV-2 vaccine candidate: a new partnership between Institut Pasteur, CEPI, Thémis and MSD
Institut Pasteur announces recent advances in the development of one of its candidate vaccines, MV-SARS-CoV-2, using the measles vector, as part of a renewed partnership with CEPI and the companies Thémis and MSD.
With over 100 vaccine projects in development worldwide, the development of a vaccine against SARS CoV-2 infection remains a challenge, with many scientific uncertainties ahead. The timeline and type of candidate vaccine are still unknown at this time. Therefore, every effort must be made to develop different vaccine approaches so that one can be developed as soon as possible.
On March 19, 2020, Institut Pasteur announced that the international coalition CEPI (Coalition for Epidemic Preparedness Innovations) had allocated 4.3 million euros for the first stages of research and development of a vaccine against SARS-CoV-2. This vaccine, MV-SARS-CoV-2 (phase 1 is scheduled to begin later in 2020), takes advantage of the versatile measles virus-based vaccine platform that has emerged from this research.
The development of MV-SARS-CoV-2 is being conducted in partnership with the Austrian biotech company Thémis, which is responsible for the production of preclinical and, clinical batches. Institut Pasteur commends the work and investments made by Thémis since 2012, which have given an industrial development perspective to the measles platform on the basis of which three candidate vaccines against emerging diseases are already in clinical development: against Chikungunya infection, against Zika and against Lassa fever benefiting from funding by CEPI. This type of partnership is essential to enable the transition from research to industrial production.
The acquisition of Thémis by the international pharmaceutical group MSD, one of the world leaders in the field of vaccines, announced today, is a major opportunity for the further development of MV-SARS-CoV-2 and, if successful, for its industrial production and accessibility. Indeed, the large production capacities available to a company of the size of MSD constitute an essential asset, which, if vaccine development is successful, will determine the availability of hundreds of millions of doses as quickly as possible.