Cape Town drug company Afrigen has become the first African laboratory to partner with the US government’s Vaccine Research Centre to develop mRNA vaccine technology in SA and low-income countries.
The collaboration, announced on Friday, also comes after SA scientists led by Prof Patrick Arbuthnot, head of Wits University’s antiviral gene therapy research unit, were able to create an mRNA vaccine against Covid-19 from limited publicly available information.
New research released last week shows the SA mRNA vaccine candidate appears to work in mice to prevent Covid-19 infection.
Being able to use the hi-tech laboratory at Afrigen to create a Covid-19 mRNA vaccine was needed as a proof of concept to demonstrate that the SA laboratory and scientists have the know-how to conduct mRNA research. The research ultimately aims to develop vaccines and treatments for diseases such as malaria, TB and HIV.
The US National Institutes of Health (NIH) collaboration with Afrigen will enable the sharing of scientific expertise. SA has a long history of working with the US government’s NIH to conduct medical research on HIV and TB. The organisation spent $77.9m on research in SA in 2021.
Afrigen is already part of the mRNA technology transfer hub programme that was established by the Covax vaccine manufacturing task force with the World Health Organization (WHO) and the Geneva-based Medicines Patent Pool to establish locally owned mRNA manufacturing capabilities in developing countries.
Afrigen is a biotech company owned by multinational pharmaceutical company Avacare and it also has funding from the Industrial Development Corporation (IDC). Its work with the WHO and US government on mRNA, however, is not for profit.
Arbuthnot, whose Wits unit works with the SA Medical Research Council, led the initiative to develop a Covid-19 mRNA vaccine with Afrigen as “a reference point” for further research.
Drug companies, such as Moderna, who developed mRNA vaccines have not shared their technology and patents with low-income countries.
“We really had to trawl through the available information in the public domain to try to get together what is required to make the vaccine,” said Arbuthnot. “That was not particularly straightforward because the information is not complete.”
Data from Wits released last week shows the vaccine enables mice immune systems to produce antibodies that effectively protect against Covid-19.
Arbuthnot said the end point of the research is to develop their own vaccines.
“We are trying to own [our own] intellectual property to make sure we can develop products that cannot be commercialised so that the whole venture can be more sustainable.”
Afrigen technical director Caryn Fenner said its mRNA research has three aims: to create its own intellectual property; to reduce the costs of mRNA vaccines; and to work on them to make them more stable so they can be stored at warmer temperatures.
For now, mRNA vaccines must be kept at -70°C.
Prof Glenda Gray, head of the SA Medical Research Council, said it is hoped that mRNA technology will allow SA to research, develop and trial vaccines targeting TB and HIV.
She said the technology is good for manufacturing vaccines at scale that would be relatively inexpensive.
mRNA technology that came to the forefront during the Covid-19 pandemic has proved effective at delivering vaccines as it appears to wake up two parts of the immune system, both as antibodies and as a T cell response.
The SA Medical Research Council will test the new Covid-19 vaccines developed by the Afrigen lab and Arbuthnot in humans for safety in 2023.
Speaking about the launch of the partnership with the US government, Gray said SA is chosen as a partner for medical research by the US because of its world-class scientists, excellent laboratory skills, top health regulatory agencies and clinical trial experience.
“We have great clinical trial capability that was demonstrated. during the pandemic [when] we were able to rapidly turn our [HIV] clinical trial sites into Covid-19 vaccine trial sites.”
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