Institutes & Pharma Co Running a Race to Deliver COVID-19 Vaccine

Elisa Granato, Molecular Microbiologist of University of Oxford
was the first volunteer in the Oxford vaccine trial for COVID-19

As I joined my medical career in 2007, there was a different drug practice, and now it has changed a lot. My pharma textbook had mere 10 sentences on carbapenems but they became ubiquitous in present critical care units. For last 5 years (atleast) I saw a good number of drugs being approved by FDA, many of them are monoclonal antibodies (mab) for autoimmune diseases or for cancer treatment. I am not sure about their efficacy but I know these are not cheap! 

However as 2020 saw a pandemic of COVID-19 by beta coronavirus, I can see a race to deliver potential vaccine candidate to humankind is already started by educational institutes as well as pharma companies. 


I had made a list of potential vaccine candidates against COVID-19. This list is not inclusive of all vaccines, because it was done in early to mid April '20. I will try to update the list as I get time. 

• BioNTech, Pfizer, and Fosun Pharma - BNT162 (mRNA vaccine)
• CanSino Biologics and Beijing Institute of Biotechnology - Ad5-nCov
• Inovio Pharmaceuticals and Beijing Advaccine Biotechnology - INO-4800 
• Moderna (US) - mRNA-1273
• University of Oxford - ChAdOx1
• Shenzhen Geno-Immune Medical Institute - LV-SMENP-DC
• Shenzhen Geno-Immune Medical Institute - Covid-19/aAPC
• University of Pittsburgh - PittCoVacc
• Janssen Pharmaceutical Cos. (J＆J) and BARDA
• Symvivo Corporation, University of British Columbia, Dalhousie University - bacTRL-Spike
• University of Wisconsin-Madison; FluGen; Bharat Biotech - CoroFlu
• Altimmune; University of Alabama at Birmingham - AdCOVID
• Arcturus Therapeutics, Duke University-National University of Singapore - LUNAR-COV19
• CEPI - CureVac
• IMV, Inc., Canadian Immunization Research Network - DPX-COVID-19
• Novavax - NVX-CoV2373
• Beijing Institute of Biological Products, China National Pharmaceutical Group - BBIBP-CorV

NewYorkTimes' COVID-19 Vaccine Tracker -  https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2020/science/coronavirus-vaccine-tracker.html

Indian companies are also running for a vaccine against Covid-19. This list includes Zydus Cadila (DNA vaccine or live attenuated vaccine), Serum Institute of India (Pune), Biological E (Hyderabad), Bharat Biotech (Hyderabad), Indian Immunologicals (Hyderabad) and Mynvax (startup developed within IISc, Bengaluru).

On June 10, Indian biotech company Panacea Biotec has announced collaboration with US based Refana Inc to develop, manufacture and distribute an inactivated COVID-19 vaccine. On August 21st Panacea announced the termination of the MoU.

I have little hope from Indian companies, but it would be a great business opportunity for them to produce tons of vaccines (which they are already doing for other diseases) and make a good revenue.