Entry into Force of Second Agreement for Supply of COVID-19 Vaccine between European Commission and Sanofi-GSK

• 21/09/2020
• Articles

As part of its European Vaccines Strategy adopted in June 2020 (see, Van Bael & Bellis Life Sciences News Alert of 18 June 2020), the European Commission (the Commission) announced on 18 September 2020 the entry into force of a second agreement providing for access to a potential vaccine against Covid-19 (see, attached press release). The Commission’s partner for the new agreement is Sanofi-GSK which has promised to sell up to 300 million doses of the new vaccine if the product materialises. The agreement would seem to emulate a similar deal with AstraZeneca in that the Commission secures the supply of vaccines for EU Member States and for a range of lower and middle income countries while financing part of the vaccine’s upfront development costs (see, Van Bael & Bellis Life Sciences News Alert of 31 August 2020). The vaccine now forms the subject of clinical trials and may become available in the second half of 2021 if it completes successfully its regulatory trajectory.
 
Sanofi and GlaxoSmithKline are developing a recombinant vaccine against Covid-19 that builds on Sanofi’s S-protein Covid-19 antigen, based on recombinant DNA technology, and GSK’s adjuvant technology. The combined approach is hoped to enhance the immune response and facilitate the production of vaccines on a large scale.