The Knowledge Sharing Centre in Cape Town has reverse-engineered the Moderna vaccine, but the long-term of the inequality initiative remains uncertain.
When it became known that scientists had developed an effective covid vaccine, Emile Hendricks was living in a disadvantaged suburb of Cape Town and studying for a degree in biotechnology.
He thought he and his network wouldn’t have to get such a vaccine, or at least they’d be at the back of line.
He’s right. By mid-April 2021, more than 32 million people in the UK had received a first dose of a covid vaccine, compared to just 300,000 in South Africa, where implementation has been fraught with problems.
“The vaccine is not available to me or anyone I know,” Hendricks says. we in Africa will have to find our own solution.
Two years later, Hendricks is a studies technologist at Afrigen Biologics and Vaccines, a Cape Town pharmaceutical company, and is part of a team that effectively replicated small amounts of Moderna’s Covid mRNA vaccine as part of a World Health Organization (WHO)-subsidized scheme. ). ) to expand vaccines in the Global South.
Scientists at the University of the Witwatersrand worked with Afrigen to deconstruct the Moderna vaccine series and build it from scratch. Such opposing engineering is legal under South African law, which is a provision that allows studies and progression to be carried out independently of patent protection.
WHO chose Moderna’s vaccine because of the abundance of public data on it and the pharmaceutical company’s commitment not to enforce covid-related patents against brands in, or safely, low- and middle-source countries during the pandemic.
So far, breeding has been tested in mice, and the strong initial effects mean human trials could begin in May next year.
The WHO mRNA centre in Cape Town will share expertise with 15 to 20 “shelves” in Africa, Latin America and Eastern Europe, creating a network of scientists who will collaborate to produce mRNA vaccines in low- and middle-income countries. Scientists from Brazil, Argentina, Indonesia and Egypt traveled to central South Africa to begin their training.
The innovative initiative is based on the idea that mRNA vaccines can have far-reaching programs in the fight against a number of diseases. The center has the prospect of developing the production capacity of other products, such as insulin to treat diabetes; anticancer drugs; and mRNA vaccines he hopes to expand for diseases such as malaria and tuberculosis.
It aims to provide a solution to vaccine inequality by ending the dependence of low- and middle-income countries on brands in richer countries. The Covid pandemic has highlighted the global dependence on Big Pharma that is basically in Europe and the United States.
“The Covid-19 pandemic has shown that reliance on a few corporations to supply global public goods is restrictive and dangerous,” WHO Director-General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus said after visiting the center in South Africa in February.
Charles Gore, chief executive of the Medicines Patent Pool (MPP), which backs the centre, said: “The silver lining of Covid is that it has focused other people’s attention on access. The tragedy is that many other people died to get that focus. .
“People have learned that this style of study and progression coming from high-income countries and given to low- and middle-income countries takes away their power, and they want to replace that and do things differently. Instead of some kind of giving program, it’s about empowerment.
However, the long term of the center is not without possible setbacks and pitfalls. For it to succeed, it will have to convince governments to buy doses from local manufacturers, even if they are more expensive in the first place.
Their freedom of action is also threatened. Moderna has filed several patents in South Africa and refused to cooperate and share the generation with the center in Africa, comparing the reproduction of the vaccine to a “copy of a Louis Vuitton bag. “In addition, Moderna is suing other mRNA vaccine makers, Pfizer. and BioNTech, which has raised concerns that it could patent in front of the center any long-term vaccine it could expand for diseases other than Covid.
Moderna’s lead executive, Stéphane Bancel, said in August: “We are bringing those demands to the cutting-edge mRNA generation platform we launched, invested billions of dollars in creating, and patented in the decade leading up to the Covid-19 pandemic. “
In March, Moderna issued a statement saying the company was “now updating its patent commitment to never enforce its COVID-19 vaccine patents as opposed to trademarks in or for the 92 low- and middle-income countries in the Gavi Covax Advanced Market Commitment (AMC), provided that the vaccines manufactured are intended only for use in AMC 92 countries. “
He continued: “In 92 non-AMC countries. . . the company expects those who use Moderna’s proprietary technologies to respect the company’s intellectual property. “
South Africa is not among the 92 countries on AMC’s list, but Moderna has shown that the center will be included in the updated commitment.
Potential issues may defend any vaccine other than Covid, however, the MPP said it will “ensure that the generation used at the center is covered by patents or licenses. . . are in a position to allow freedom to operate. “
Gore believes Moderna will deliver on its promise and denies patents becoming a problem. “We’re not going to infringe patents,” he says. Obviously, we don’t need to conflict with the pharmaceutical industry. “He hopes that if there is a patent blocking imaginable progress, the center will get a license.
However, Fatima Hassan, a South African human rights lawyer and founder of the Health Justice Initiative, is skeptical. He says there’s no guarantee Moderna won’t take legal action if there are long-term advances or breakthroughs, like any new mRNA vaccine evolved at the center.
“What is Plan B?elle asks?” Everyone is naïve to assume that [Moderna] will come to the table and everything will be fine. If Moderna can sue Pfizer, they may not hesitate to sue the center.
She criticizes the fact that the center is touted as a solution to vaccine inequality and an empowering style for low- and middle-income countries, when much of the decision-making on this factor is done through organizations like the WHO and MPP. either in Geneva.
The center has already been attacked by another branch of Big Pharma. The kENUP Foundation is a Malta-based consultancy contracted through BioNTech, the company that produces the Pfizer Covid vaccine. In a document sent to South African government officials, the base said the hub’s activity should stop.
The document said: “It is almost to reflect a vaccine production procedure without close cooperation with the inventor. The center’s plan to copy Moderna’s Covid-19 vaccine production procedure deserves to be stopped immediately. “
Petro Terblanche, managing director of Afrigen, said of the kENUP report: “It was damaging. I had to protect this allocation from my government and my shareholders,” he says. “I was disappointed. We are a small company; [the center is] all about access, empowerment and you [the kENUP Foundation] come here and try to kill it.
He then reflected on the implications for the pharmaceutical industry if the center and its partners around the world manage to develop new drugs and vaccines, and “understood why Big Pharma shoots at full steam ahead for us. “
However, when the BMJ published an article saying that WHO’s efforts to bring vaccine production to Africa were being undermined by the pharmaceutical industry, KENUP responded by saying: “The truth is the opposite. . . [The Foundation] encourages personal sector efforts to identify vaccine production. “in Africa. “
For now, however, the paintings remain at Afrigen’s headquarters in Cape Town.
Hendricks prepares for a day’s work in the lab. He dreams of developing a vaccine against HIV, which is one of South Africa’s most serious physical disorders, and Hendricks himself has lost his relatives to AIDS. He says: “We seek to deal with the burden of disease that is so unique to Africa, anything that has never been given to the real day or the resources [needed]. I’m thrilled to be a part of it.
Subscribe to another attitude with our Global Dispatch newsletter: a summary of our most productive stories from around the world, readings and reflections from our team on key issues of progress and human rights, which are sent to your inbox every two weeks: