China's CanSino confident its mRNA COVID vaccine as good as Moderna, Pfizer shots

Cansino Biologics

03/02/2023 15:52

By Natalie  Grover and Sophie Yu
       LONDON, Feb 3 (Reuters) - CanSino Biologics  6185.HK 
CEO Yu Xuefeng said on Friday he was  confident his company's
experimental COVID-19 vaccine using messenger RNA (mRNA)
technology was as good as shots from Moderna and
Pfizer-BioNTech.
    As the COVID-19 pandemic evolves in China after the country
abandoned its zero-COVID policy in December, domestic companies
like CanSino are racing to develop mRNA COVID vaccines.  
    The country - which experienced a wave of infections across
its 1.4 billion population after the sudden relaxation of COVID
restrictions - has so far declined to use mRNA vaccines from
abroad, and has yet to approve a domestic one that uses the
technology.
     Approved vaccines in China are widely considered less
effective than the Moderna  MRNA.O  and Pfizer  PFE.N -BioNTech 
 22UAy.DE  mRNA shots.
     Yu acknowledged that it was not possible to directly test
the CanSino vaccine versus the Moderna or Pfizer-BioNTech shots
in a head-to-head trial because they were not available in
China.
    "But just based on published data...I'm confident our
product is as good as the already launched mRNA vaccines," he
told Reuters in an interview.
    In January, CanSino reported "positive" interim data from
its experimental COVID-19 mRNA booster vaccine, CS-2034, in a
mid-stage clinical trial. 
    The 433-person trial evaluated the use of CS-2034 in people
who had already received three doses of an inactivated vaccine,
against an additional shot of an inactivated vaccine. 
    Inactivated vaccines contain a dead form of the pathogen, in
this case the COVID-causing virus SARS-COV-2, to help the immune
system trigger a response without causing illness.
    After 28 days following the booster shots, adults in the
CS-2034 group had virus-neutralizing antibodies at levels that
were 27 times as high as those in the inactivated vaccine group
against the original Wuhan strain, and 23 times higher against
the BA.1 Omicron variant, the company said.
 (Reporting by Natalie Grover in London and Sophie Yu in
Beijing; Editing by Emelia Sithole-Matarise)
 ((natalie.grover@thomsonreuters.com; Twitter: @NatalieGrover;))