SA’s biggest pharmaceutical manufacturer, Aspen Pharmacare, has concluded a 10-year agreement with the Serum Institute of India (SII) to bottle four vaccines it will market and distribute under its own brand in Africa.
The agreement is expected to improve Africa’s security of supply and use spare capacity in Aspen’s Gqeberha facility, which has lines standing idle due to lower-than-expected sales of Johnson & Johnson’s Covid-19 vaccines. Aspen reached an agreement last year to bottle J&J’s shot, and then extended the deal to produce the jab under its own brand, Aspenovax, but it has seen dwindling demand from J&J and received no orders for its own-brand shot.
Earlier this year, Aspen CEO Stephen Saad said the company was considering switching some of the site’s capacity to manufacturing anaesthetics. The new vaccine agreement makes that prospect less likely.
“These are vaccines with very high volumes and sustainable demand. They get ordered every year,” said Saad.
“Factories rely on predictable volumes. This is just the first step. There will be other agreements to follow,” he added.
Aspen’s production of Covid-19 shots had demonstrated Africa had the capacity to manufacture vaccines, he said. Africa imports 99% of all its vaccines due to a lack of regional manufacturing capacity, a weakness that left it at the back of the queue for Covid-19 vaccines.
“We are cost-effective and efficient,” said Saad.
The vaccines included in the deal with SII are used in routine childhood immunisation programmes across the continent. They include vaccines against pneumococcal disease and rotavirus, as well as a polyvalent meningitis jab and a six-in-one hexavalent vaccine that protects babies against diphtheria, tetanus, whooping cough, polio, Haemophilus influenza type B and hepatitis B.
The terms of the deal include a technical transfer and formulation fill-and-finish arrangement, which grants Aspen the rights to manufacture the products from bulk drug substance supplied by SII.
The vaccines will be made available on the continent through designated multilateral organisations, as well as AU member states and other public and private sector customers, Aspen said in a statement.
Aspen anticipates receiving grant funding from the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation and the Coalition for Epidemic Preparedness Innovations, to support regional manufacturing capacity for an affordable supply of vaccines to African countries.
Earlier this year, the AU called on multilateral agencies such as the Global Access to Vaccines Initiative to commit to purchasing at least 30% of the continent’s needs from African manufacturers.
The four Aspen-branded routine vaccines in Africa exclude certain markets due to SII having provided prior rights to third parties.
Aspen said several other potential long-term opportunities were being explored with various multinational partners and could be concluded by the end of the 2023 financial year.
Update: August 31 2022
This article has been updated with new information.
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