CEPI backs Minapharm’s Bundibugyo ebolavirus vaccine candidate
African biopharmaceutical company Minapharm Group will receive up to $16.5 million from the Coalition for Epidemic Preparedness Innovations (CEPI) to advance the development of a Bundibugyo ebolavirus vaccine candidate.
The investment is part of efforts to develop vaccines to combat the fastest-growing and second-largest Ebola outbreak on record affecting the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC).
The investigational vaccine becomes the fifth Bundibugyo-specific virus vaccine candidate supported by CEPI in response to the escalating epidemic.
Minapharm’s Bundibugyo vaccine is designed by ProBioGen, a Berlin-based specialist within Minapharm Group, based on their modified vaccinia Ankara (MVA) vaccine platform, MVA-CR19.
A similar technology underpins a licensed vaccine against smallpox and mpox, and has elicited long-term immunity in a vaccine targeting the related Zaire ebolavirus.
CEPI’s funding will advance the Bundibugyo vaccine candidate through preclinical development and into an early-stage clinical trial to assess the immunogenicity and safety of the vaccine candidate.
It is the only Bundibugyo vaccine candidate CEPI is funding that is designed to induce both B- and T-cell responses.
“CEPI’s funding to Minapharm harnesses the growing strength of African-led innovation to help confront this increasingly severe outbreak and prepare for future threats,” said Dr Richard Hatchett, CEO of CEPI. “We are proud to support Minapharm’s Bundibugyo vaccine candidate: it will round out CEPI’s portfolio, give the world another shot on goal, and advance Minapharm’s proprietary MVA platform, which if successful can serve as the basis for future African-manufactured filovirus vaccines. The faster we can advance a pipeline of promising candidates, the better our chances of saving lives and bringing this epidemic under control.”
CEPI’s goal is to bring at least two Bundibugyo vaccines to Emergency Use Authorisation and WHO Prequalification to respond to this outbreak, while also building readiness for future Bundibugyo epidemics.