vaccine
RNA technology already helped thousands of patients
"RNA-based technology can help babies with spinal muscular atrophy reach milestones such as sitting, standing and walking", says rare disease expert Prof. Annemieke Aartsma-Rus (Leiden University Medical Center, the Netherlands). This Wednesday 25 January the European Parliament's Panel for the Future of Science and Technology will hold its Annual Lecture on the future of RNA-based ...
A scientist’s opinion: interview with Maria Elena Bottazzi on vaccines in low- and middle-income countries
Maria Elena Bottazzi, born in Italy, raised in Honduras, is a microbiologist and infectious disease expert at Baylor College of Medicine (Houston, United States). She and her colleague Peter Hotez led a team in India to develop the Covid-19 vaccine Corbevax, get it manufactured, and then give it away to low- and middle-income countries, patent-free. ...
Low cost and open source: vaccines in developing countries
In South Africa, a scientific knowledge transfer hub is working to create a Covid-19 vaccine based on the publicly available sequence of Moderna's mRNA vaccine, without Moderna's involvement but with its approval. In India, scientists are also testing a vaccine to fight SARS-CoV-2. These seem to be big steps for developing countries in order to ...
A scientist’s opinion: interview with Petro Terblanche on the first African vaccine hub
Petro Terblanche is Health Science Professor at North-West University and is Managing Director at Afrigen Biologics in South Africa. Next to developing an open source vaccine, Afrigen hosts a global vaccine hub to build capacity and capabilities in low- and middle-income countries to design, develop and produce messenger RNA (mRNA) vaccines. Professor Terblanche, as managing ...
COVAX and the challenges of worldwide vaccine access
Vaccines are showing us a way out of the coronavirus pandemic, but vaccine access is still shockingly inequitable. Over a billion doses have been administered since December 2020, but the vast majority have gone to citizens of high-income countries. The COVAX initiative, a unique collaboration led by the Vaccine Alliance Gavi, the Coalition for Epidemic Preparedness Innovations (CEPI) and the World Health Organization (WHO), aims to combat this injustice.
A scientist’s opinion: Interview with Aurélia Nguyen about the Global Alliance for Vaccines and Immunisation (Gavi)
We spoke to Aurélia Nguyen, Managing Director of the COVAX Facility at Gavi. Gavi was founded in response to a market failure: by the late 90s, many powerful vaccines were becoming available, but they were too expensive for low-income countries, and millions of children were unable to benefit from them. In 1997, the Bill and ...
A scientist’s opinion: Interview with Dr Frederik Kristensen about the Coalition for Epidemic Preparedness Innovations (CEPI)
Dr Frederik Kristensen on COVAX: ‘The biggest mass immunisation effort in history’. He has been with the Coalition for Epidemic Preparedness Innovations (CEPI) in Norway since late 2016, initially as Senior Medical Officer, and since January 2018 as Deputy CEO. He started his career as a general practitioner, and before joining CEPI he worked as ...
ESMH Media Review – May 12, 2021
Disinformation, AI & Covid-19: check out the ESMH selection of 29 science & tech news published in the last weeks on the web.