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CIDRAP- Sanofi taps Brazilian researchers to speed Zika vaccine

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  • CIDRAP- Sanofi taps Brazilian researchers to speed Zika vaccine

    Source: http://www.cidrap.umn.edu/news-persp...d-zika-vaccine

    Sanofi taps Brazilian researchers to speed Zika vaccine
    Filed Under:
    Zika
    Lisa Schnirring | News Editor | CIDRAP News
    | Oct 27, 2016
    Sanofi today announced it has signed an agreement with Brazil's Fiocruz Institute, making it part of a team to streamline the development of a Zika virus vaccine based on a candidate from Walter Reed Army Institute of Research (WRAIR).
    In other developments, the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) reported more infections in pregnant women, in travelers, and in residents of US territories, and Florida reported a new locally transmitted case as well as more travel-linked cases.
    Vaccine collaboration

    Sanofi's announcement comes in the wake of an agreement in July between its vaccine division (Sanofi Pasteur) and WRAIR to develop a Zika vaccine using WRAIR's Zika purified inactivated virus (ZPIV) technology, the company said in a press release today.
    That linkage was designed to scale up clinical materials to support phase 2 trails. WRAIR and the National Institutes of Allergy and Infectious Diseases (NIAID) are supporting phase 1 trials.
    In late September, Sanofi Pasteur received a $43 million award from the US Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) Biomedical Advanced Research and Development Authority (BARDA) to speed the development of a Zika vaccine.
    The company said in its announcement that bringing the Fiocruz Institute into the vaccine collaboration adds more expertise and increases the likelihood of developing and licensing a Zika vaccine as quickly as possible. For example, it said Fiocruz's involvement could include process development, vaccine characterization, epidemiologic studies, preclinical and clinical evaluation of the vaccine, and clinical assay optimization.
    Sanofi Pasteur, which has developed vaccines against other flaviviruses, said it is working on clinical development and regulatory strategies, while WRAIR and NIAID conduct phase 1 clinical trials.
    John Shiver, PhD, senior vice president of research and development at Sanofi, said in the press release that the three groups have a history of working together. "It only makes sense for the pursuit of public health that we combine our expertise and resources on Zika with Fiocruz, which is ideally based in Brazil where the heart of the current Zika experience lies," he said.
    More infected pregnant women

    US states, meanwhile, have reported 54 more Zika infections in pregnant women, increasing the total to 953 cases, the CDC said today in its weekly update. The territories reported 100 more infections in pregnant women, putting the total at 2,027 so far.
    The number of Zika-affected live births in the United States held at 23, while the number of pregnancy losses related to the disease remained at 5. States reported 1 more sexually transmitted Zika case, with that total at 33 now. One case of Guillain-Barre syndrome (GBS) was subtracted from the total, which is now at 13. States reported 73 more infections in travelers, boosting that number to 3,951.
    US territories reported 1,313 more local Zika infections, stretching that total to 28,627, 98% of them in Puerto Rico. Officials reported 3 more related GBS cases in US territories, lifting that number to 43.
    New Florida cases

    Today the Florida Department of Health (Florida Health) reported one more local Zika infection, involving a person exposed in the Wynwood area who was sick in July and whose illness was just confirmed by the CDC. Florida Health said the development doesn't affect the lifting of the active transmission zone in that neighborhood. Florida now has 181 local Zika cases.
    Also today officials announced 14 more travel-related Zika cases in four different counties, as well as 7 more infections in pregnant women. The additions bring Florida's number of imported Zika cases to 765 and the number of infected pregnant women to 122. For the infections in pregnant women, the state doesn't distinguish travel and local cases.
    Meanwhile, the CDC today provided an update on the battle against Zika in Florida, noting that response steps by federal and state officials are working, with Miami-Dade County recently interrupting Zika transmission in the Wynwood area with a comprehensive strategy that involved aerial spraying and low mosquito counts seen recently in traps in Miami-Dade County and Miami Beach.
    CDC Director Tom Frieden, MD, MPH, traveled to Miami on Oct 25 to meet with county and city officials, tour the affected areas, and discuss Zika battle strategies for the area for the months ahead, according to an e-mail press release. "CDC applauds the intensive case investigation and vector control efforts of our colleagues in Florida," the agency said in the release.
    "Despite this progress, Zika remains unpredictable, and we can't let down our guard," the agency said, adding that it is committed to working with state and local partners to provide residents and visitors with transparent, timely information.
    Today the CDC held a seminar with Florida Health on Zika clinical management for obstetrics and gynecology physicians, something the state's Gov. Rick Scott had requested.
    In a related development, Florida's Surgeon General Celeste Philip, MD, MPH, sent a letter yesterday to Miami-Dade County Mayor Carlos Gimenez asking for more details on how the county has spend $12 million in state funds to battle the mosquitoes that carry Zika. She asked for more frequent and detailed mosquito trap counts to help with investigations and to help gauge the effectiveness of control methods.
    She also asked the county for updates on its current mosquito control plans and the strategy officials expect to use for the winter months.
    WHO update and response

    In its weekly situation report on Zika virus, the World Health Organization (WHO) said no new countries reported mosquito-borne Zika for the first time, and no additional countries reported their first Zika-linked birth defects or GBS complications.
    Globally, the WHO said it has received 2,199 reports of Zika-related birth defects from 23 different countries, most of them from Brazil. It noted that health officials are still investigating possible Zika involvement in a microcephaly case reported recently in Vietnam, as well as five microcephaly cases reported over the summer in Guinea Bissau.
    Several countries?including Thailand, the Philippines, Cuba, the United States, and Bolivia?have held Zika technical meetings or awareness campaigns during the past month, the agency said.
    Meanwhile, the WHO noted yesterday's publication of its formal Zika research agenda and its first quarterly update on its Zika response plan, which covers response steps from July through December 2017.
    According to the update, the WHO has scaled back its request from donors to fund the Zika response to $112.5 million, down from its $122 million request over the summer. So far the response to the WHO's request has been lukewarm, with $24 million pledged from 13 donors.
    See also:
    Oct 27 Sanofi press release
    Oct 27 CDC Zika updates
    Oct 27 Florida Health daily Zika update
    Oct 26 letter from Florida surgeon general
    Oct 26 WHO Zika virus research agenda
    Oct 27 WHO Zika response plan quarterly update



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