Large Vaccine Players Including GSK, Moderna Prepare For Bird Flu Vaccine 'Just In Case'

Executives at GSK Plc GSK, Moderna Inc MRNA, and CSL Seqirus, owned by CSL Ltd CSLLY, said they are developing or about to test sample human vaccines against bird flu as a precautionary measure against a future pandemic.
Others, like Sanofi SA SNY, said they "stand ready" to begin production if needed, with existing H5N1 vaccine strains in stock.
Reuters report citing global health experts & companies says that most potential human doses are reserved for wealthy countries in long-standing preparedness contracts.
An international framework for pandemic flu allocates 10% of the global supply for the World Health Organization (WHO) to share with low- and middle-income countries.
But the WHO seeks guarantees of 20% global supply for other types of the pandemic as many vaccine-rich countries inoculated large proportions of their populations before considering sharing doses.
The U.N. agency said it had signed legally binding agreements with 14 manufacturers for 10% of their pandemic flu vaccine in a mix of donated doses and doses to be bought at affordable prices.
In a pandemic, vaccine manufacturers would shift production of seasonal flu vaccines and instead make shots tailored to the new outbreak when needed. They can make hundreds of millions of doses.
The WHO said there are nearly 20 licensed vaccines against the broader H5 strain of flu. Existing antiviral treatments for people already infected will also help mitigate the impact.
Moderna's mRNA vaccine research actually began with the pandemic flu, and was modified for COVID, said Raffael Nachbagauer, executive director of infectious diseases at Moderna.
The company plans to launch a small human trial of an mRNA pandemic flu vaccine tailored to the new avian influenza subtype in the first half of 2023, he said, adding Moderna could respond "very quickly" in an outbreak scenario.
Image by Jeyaratnam Caniceus from Pixabay

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