Dengue Vaccine Candidate Launches Study in Switzerland

UK-based Emergex Vaccines Holding Limited announced today that Swiss regulatory authorities, including the Swiss Agency for Therapeutic Products (Swissmedic), have granted approval for a Phase I clinical trial of the company's dengue vaccine candidate PepGNP-Dengue.

Emergex uses 100% synthetic vaccines to ‘prime’ naive CD8+ T-Cells to generate virus-specific CD8+ Cytotoxic T Lymphocyte cells to kill infected cells before productive viral infection, thus preventing viral replication and disease in the vaccinated person. 

The Phase I trial, named naNO-DENGUE, will evaluate Emergex’s novel T-Cell priming vaccine, designed to deliver broad and long-lasting immunity by priming the body’s T-Cell response to provide rapid clearance of infected cells in the event of an infection.

This double-blind, randomized, and comparator-controlled study will evaluate the safety of the investigational vaccine, PepGNP-Dengue. In addition, evidence of a T-cell mediated immune response as a surrogate of protection against severe Dengue disease will also be evaluated.

Athan Papadopoulos, Emergex Vaccines Chief Medical Officer, stated in a press release, “Emergex’s approach to vaccine development may offer significant potential benefits over existing approaches in terms of disease prevention and applicability to a range of serious diseases."

"T-Cells, as also seen lately, are one of the most important parts of the immune system. Without T-Cells, we could not survive. We are proud to be working on this program and welcome the opportunity to gather data to support the development of this novel technology.”

Emergex is a privately held biotechnology company headquartered in Abingdon, UK, with an operating subsidiary in Doylestown, Pennsylvania, USA.