• Advances: China publishes first clinical trial of a coronavirus vaccine that is safe and creates immunity

Almost four months ago, the Chinese Ministry of Defense released a statement explaining that a team of experts from the Biotechnology Institute of the Academy of Military Medical Sciences, in collaboration with a company called CanSino Biologics, had successfully developed a vaccine against Covid. -19 and that human trials were to begin. It had only been a few hours since the same statement was released in the United States. China did not want to be left behind. The frantic race to find the vaccine had begun. A well-known face in the fight against the SARS virus and Ebola was put in charge of the Chinese team: Chen Wei, epidemiologist and army general.

Today, from CanSino Biologics, a vaccine maker based in the port city of Tianjin, in northern China, they have communicated that the army has received the approval of the Central Military Commission so that the soldiers can inject the recombinant vaccine ( adenovirus type five vector: Ad5-nCoV) after "clinical trials demonstrated that it was safe and somewhat efficient". Following phase 1 and phase 2 trials, the results indicate that Ad5-nCoV "has the potential to prevent disease caused by SARS-CoV-2". The use of the vaccine by the military has been approved for a period of one year. We must remember that the Chinese army vaccine is one of the eight candidates currently being developed by companies and researchers in the Asian giant.

" Ad5-nCoV is currently limited to military use only and its use cannot be expanded to a broader vaccination range without the approval of the Department of the Military Commission," says the statement by CanSino, a company with a value on the Stock Exchange. Hong Kong's $ 3.5 billion and has already launched 16 vaccines against 13 diseases. Although Yu Xuefeng, the company's president, has warned that "trials only show that the vaccine has the potential to prevent Covid-19 and that military approval does not guarantee that it will be approved for broader commercial use in the future."

a history of years

CanSino's story is that of a group of young Chinese scientists who met 20 years ago studying at McGill University in Montreal (Canada) and who returned to China in 2009 to start their own company. Precisely in mid-May, CanSino announced a partnership with the National Research Council of Canada and obtained the green light to begin clinical trials with Canadian patients. These months, the company has been developing the vaccine together with the Chinese Academy of Military Medical Sciences. The two organizations are basing the Covid-19 experimental vaccine on their previous collaboration, led by General Chen Wei, on an Ebola vaccine that the Chinese government approved for widespread use in 2017.

In March, during Phase 1 of the human clinical trial, 108 volunteers from Wuhan City were recruited and had to be confined for 14 days at a specialized center. That number was in turn divided into three groups, who received different doses of the new vaccine: high, medium and low. The treatment was successfully completed on April 2 and was intended to assess its effectiveness and safety. Phase 2, completed on June 11, has had 500 volunteers, but in their case they have been able to participate in the tests from their homes and have been able to be monitored remotely.

"The experimental results must be interpreted with caution. Inducing an immune response does not necessarily indicate that the vaccine can fully protect humans from the new coronavirus infection. Although the development of the new vaccine has positive prospects, much work remains to be done." , Dr. Chen Wei has insisted these weeks.

As of Sunday, the World Health Organization said that 17 candidate vaccines for Covid-19 were under clinical evaluation, with another 131 in preclinical stages.

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