Following months of collaborative development work, Aerogen® (Galway, Ireland) and CanSinoBIO (SSE: 688185, HKEX: 06185) (Tianjin, China) have announced a development and commercial supply partnership for the inhaled delivery of CanSinoBIO’s Recombinant Novel Coronavirus Vaccine Convidecia™ utilizing Aerogen’s proprietary vibrating mesh aerosol drug delivery technology.
The aerosolised vaccine is directly inhaled via a cup dispenser into the patient’s airway. This route mimics the natural infection pathway of the respiratory virus COVID-19 and may create additional benefits through generating mucosal immunity.
The interim results of Phase 3 clinical trials conducted by CanSinoBIO demonstrated that Convidecia™ has an efficacy of 95.47% at preventing severe disease 14 days after single-dose vaccination.1
Inoculation by the inhaled aerosol route requires a considerably smaller volume of vaccine to be used and therefore provides the capacity to allow a much larger number of patients to cost-effectively access the CanSinoBIO vaccine than would have been possible using an injectable approach.2
John Power, Aerogen CEO & Founder said “The world has an urgent need for an effective, low cost, globally scalable and globally accessible solution to mass vaccination. The pioneering development undertaken by Aerogen and CanSino has resulted in a system that meets all these requirements and with a capacity to vaccinate in the billions.”
Dr. Xuefeng YU, Chairman and Chief Executive Officer of CanSinoBIO commented; “Our partnership with Aerogen started in 2013 and for almost a decade, we’ve been advancing the possibility of aerosol drug delivery. The innovative development on the inhaled delivery of COVID-19 vaccine is the testimony of our collaborative efforts. It is demonstrated that the aerosolised vaccine can stimulate mucosal immunity and significantly reduce the risk of transmission, which could be a solution to rapidly build mass immune protection and accelerate the end of the pandemic.”
CanSinoBio is preparing an application for commercial authorisation in China. Further clinical trials are in the process of being prepared for other countries.
Commercial terms of the partnership have not been disclosed.