KALKARA, Malta- 28 July 2021– Today, BioNTech SE (“BioNTech”) announced the start of its Malaria project which aims at the development of a safe and highly effective malaria vaccine and the implementation of sustainable vaccine supply solutions on the African continent. The company’s project is part of a programme by the kENUP Foundation to accelerating the eradication of Malaria. This goal was out of reach so far, despite enormous financial and public health efforts of the global community. The scientific and entrepreneurial progress made during the COVID-19 pandemic raise hopes that a highly efficacious vaccine could soon help to eradicate Malaria.
BioNTech aims to develop a safe and highly effective mRNA vaccine with durable protective immunity for prevention of malaria and disease associated mortality. To this end, BioNTech will assess multiple vaccine candidates featuring known Malaria targets such as the circumsporozoite protein (CSP), as well as new antigens discovered in the pre-clinical research phase. The most promising mRNA vaccine candidates will be selected for clinical development. The start of the clinical trial for the first vaccine candidate is planned for 2022.
In addition, BioNTech is dedicated to the development of sustainable vaccine production and supply solutions on the African continent. BioNTech plans to co-locate its African manufacturing capabilities with the technology transfer hubs under development by WHO, in alignment with the African manufacturing strategy convened and promoted by the Africa CDC. Those initiatives aim at expanding the capacity of low- and middle-income countries (LMICs) to manufacture contemporary vaccines end-to-end, and scale up production to increase global access to these critical tools to bring current and future pandemics under control.
Initiated by the kENUP Foundation’s eradicateMalaria initiative, under the joint convening power of WHO and the Africa CDC, and supporting Team Europe’s Sustainable Healthcare Industry for Resilience in Africa (SHIRA) initiative, BioNTech will evaluate how to establish sustainable mRNA manufacturing capabilities on the African continent to supply African countries with vaccines.
This project is an extension of BioNTech’s COVID-19 vaccine efforts. Building on two decades of mRNA research and its clinical stage mRNA platform, BioNTech has co-developed the first mRNA-based COVID-19 vaccine together with its partner Pfizer. BioNTech and Pfizer pledged to deliver two billion doses of their COVID-19 vaccine to middle- and low-income countries over the next 18 months. One billion doses are planned to be provided in 2021. Doses to eligible countries will be provided at a not-for-profit price.
On July 21, BioNTech and Pfizer announced a joint manufacturing project with the Biovac Institute (Pty) Ltd a Cape Town-based, South African biopharmaceutical company, to fill & finish the Pfizer-BioNTech COVID-19 vaccine for distribution within the African Union, with additional investments in upstream manufacturing to follow from BioNTech in due time.
Established mRNA vaccine manufacturing capacities in low and lower middle income countries could be used for the production of various mRNA-based vaccines, once they have been successfully developed and approved. This approach would ensure long-term, sustainable operation of newly established mRNA manufacturing capacities.
