Text size
Sanofi
on Monday rolled out new data on its Covid-19 vaccine, making the case that a new version of the protein-based vaccine can compete in the booster market against the dominant messenger RNA-based Covid-19 vaccines from
Pfizer
and
Moderna
.
Sanofi (ticker: SNY) and its partner
GSK
(GSK), each giant vaccine makers in their own right, are collaborating on what they call a next-generation Covid-19 booster, designed to specifically target the Beta variant. While the Beta variant is currently extinct, outcompeted by more recent variants, Sanofi says new studies show that their booster induces strong protection against other variants of concern, including Omicron BA.1 and Omicron BA.2.
The idea is that a Beta-specific vaccine could offer broader protections against a range of newer variants, given the Beta variant’s specific mutations. If so, it could address the challenge of designing vaccines to keep up with the rapidly changing virus.
“The Beta variant expresses similar mutations across multiple variants of concern, including Omicron, making it a strong vaccine candidate to confer broad protection against multiple strains of Covid-19,” said the executive vice president of Sanofi’s vaccines division, Thomas Triomphe, in a statement.
Sanofi said that one study of adults who had already received two doses of an mRNA-based Covid-19 vaccine found that a boost with the Sanofi/GSK booster significantly increased the antibody response levels against multiple variants of concern. It said that the immune response to BA.1 and BA.2 was twice as strong as that generated by an earlier Sanofi/GSK booster that was designed to protect against the original Wuhan strain of the virus.
Another study, run by the large French hospital system Assistance Publique—Hôpitaux de Paris, compared the Beta-specific Sanofi/GSK vaccine with the earlier Wuhan-specific Sanofi/GSK vaccine and Pfizer’s (PFE) vaccine, which also targets the original Wuhan strain. When used as a booster, the study found that the Beta-specific Sanofi/GSK vaccine induced a stronger neutralizing antibody response to both the original Wuhan strain and the Beta strain.
The study, which has not yet been peer reviewed, found that a higher proportion of the subjects who received the Beta-specific booster saw at least a tenfold increase in neutralizing antibody levels to the original Wuhan strain after 15 days than those who received the Pfizer vaccine.
The study’s authors wrote that the findings suggest that Beta-specific vaccines “may represent an interesting strategy for broader protection against SARS CoV-2 variants.”
GSK and Sanofi, which teamed up early in the pandemic to develop a Covid-19 vaccine, were early favorites in the Covid-19 vaccine race. Their approach, which was based on…
Read More: Sanofi, GSK’s Beta-Specific Covid Booster May Protect Against Multiple Variants