South Africa takes first step to manufacture Covid-19 vaccines

Published on : 06/22/2021 – 07:36

“The vaccines never come on time and people keep dying.” South Africa took a first step on Monday, June 21 to provide the continent with a production capacity for anti-Covid vaccines, announced President Cyril Ramaphosa, warning that it will take time to materialize the project.

The South African leader, spearheading the fight for the temporary lifting of intellectual property on anti-Covid vaccines and slayer of vaccine inequality, justified the creation of a regional production capacity: “We can see that ‘you can’t rely on vaccines that are made outside of Africa because they never come. They never arrive on time and people keep dying. “

He was participating from South Africa in a World Health Organization (WHO) press briefing in Geneva on the project.

2% of the vaccinated population in Africa

His country represents more than 35% of the total Covid-19 cases recorded in Africa and is currently suffering from a third wave of infections. Like other developing countries, he sees vaccines going to wealthy countries or to countries that, like India, produce them on a large scale.

Only 2% of the population of the African continent has had at least one dose, said President Ramaphosa, when the United States or Europe is targeting 70% of the population fully immune in the coming months.

Monday’s announcement must eventually remedy this imbalance. This involves setting up a “technology transfer center” for anti-Covid messenger RNA vaccines, which have proved to be extremely effective like the sera from Pfizer-BioNTech or Moderna and which also seem more easily adaptable to new variants than other vaccines of different technology.

“This technology hub will allow a rapid response for the development of new vaccines, whether for Covid-19 variants or future pathogens, on the African continent and for the benefit of the whole world,” said French President Emmanuel Macron , in a recorded message.

He pledged, in addition to the donation of vaccines, to help Africa build up its own production capacity.

The project is led by a South African consortium made up of biotechnology companies Biovac and Afrigen Biologics and Vaccines, a network of universities and African Centers for Disease Control.

A “technology transfer center”

WHO has already established such centers with the aim of boosting the global production of influenza vaccines. In fact, these centers provide know-how and training to local manufacturers where the technology taught is available on an industrial scale.

Manufacturers in low- and middle-income countries who are interested can find the necessary training and licenses here.

WHO and its partners bring their know-how in production, quality control and intellectual property rights to accelerate the diffusion of technologies.

In the South African configuration, Biovac will be the developer, Afrigen the manufacturer and the network of universities will contribute knowledge in messenger RNA, with technical support from CDC Africa.

WHO has stressed that the South African hub has available capacity.

“Vaccines produced in South Africa within 9 to 12 months”

But as WHO boss Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus reminded us: “This is an important step that will yield results in the medium term. In the short term, we must do everything in our power to increase production and equitable distribution of vaccines through Covax. “

What timetable? WHO Chief Scientific Officer Dr Soumya Swaminathan first outlined an optimistic scenario, where all goes according to plan, which would see “vaccines produced in South Africa in the next 9 to 12 months”, using already proven and approved processes.

If new methods of using messenger RNA were to be used, more time would be needed, in particular because of the necessary clinical trials.

“Moderna and Pfizer-BioNTech must immediately share their messenger RNA technology with the hub so that many more RNA vaccines can be produced independently by manufacturers in South Africa and more broadly on the African continent, as soon as possible “, reacted Kate Stegeman of the NGO Médecins sans frontières (MSF).

With AFP