Taiwan's COVID-19 Vaccine Candidate Included in the WHO Solidarity Trial

Taiwan-based Medigen Vaccine Biologics Corp announced on October 27, 2021, the MVC-COV1901 vaccine candidate is one of two finalists recommended by an independent vaccine prioritization advisory group to be included in the World Health Organisation (WHO) Solidarity Trial Vaccines (STv).

STv is an international, randomized clinical trial platform designed to rapidly evaluate the efficacy and safety of promising new candidate vaccines, contributing to creating a more extensive portfolio of vaccines needed to protect people from COVID-19 around the world.

The WHO Ethics Review Committee and relevant regulatory authorities and ethics committees of Colombia, Mali, and the Philippines approved the STv study to progress.

The national principal investigators and their research teams in over 40 sites have begun recruiting volunteers joining the STv.

The Company began developing MVC-COV1901 in February 2020 and is a subunit vaccine with recombinant S-2P antigen adjuvanted with CpG 1018 supplied by Dynavax and aluminum hydroxide.

The S-2P antigen is a trimeric and prefusion-stable recombinant spike protein developed by the U.S. National Institutes of Health (NIH).

MVC has obtained a global technology license for S-2P from the U.S. Vaccine Research Center at the NIH.

"We are extremely grateful that we have been selected to be part of the WHO International Solidarity Trial Vaccines against COVID-19. We have been working on designing a vaccine that has mild side effects and actively protects the public from the adverse effects of the virus. Seeing promising results thus far, we hope that the international trial conducted by WHO and participating countries will assist in curbing the escalation of cases," commented Charles Chen, Vice Chairman & CEO, Medigen Vaccine Biologics Corp, in a press statement.

Based on preclinical, Phase 1, and Phase 2 clinical study data, MVC-COV1901 has shown robust safety and favorable immunogenicity responses and, as a result, applied and was granted EUA in Taiwan. The Company continues to pursue global regulatory recognition.

Medigen Vaccine Biologics Corp is a biopharmaceutical company located in Taipei, TW, using cell-based technologies to develop novel vaccines and biosimilars.