CEPI announces call for proposals to innovate vaccines

WASHINGTON — With a call for proposals on Tuesday, the Coalition for Epidemic Preparedness Innovations aims to shorten the usually long time it takes to develop vaccines for emerging diseases. This call, open to a range of companies, foundations and research and development institutions, asks for ideas for “new approaches to vaccine development” that will “support the development of rapid response platforms for vaccine development, a core part of CEPI’s mission,” Richard Hatchett, the CEO of CEPI told Devex. CEPI is a partnership founded by the governments of India and Norway, the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, the Wellcome Trust and the World Economic Forum that was founded in 2016. The technologies or platforms that CEPI seeks in this call will speed the pace of vaccine development and create fast-acting vaccines that can be scaled rapidly. The focus will be on vaccine development for emerging epidemics, including for pathogens or diseases that are not yet on the public health radar. Hatchett described the call for proposals as an invitation to address the technical challenges of more rapidly developing and releasing vaccines. “It’s an insurance policy for the world,” he said. Proposals should meet a set of targets. First, there should be no more than 16 weeks between the time a virus component for the vaccine is identified and the time when the product can be released for a clinical test. Six weeks after a person gets a vaccine, they should see the benefit. And finally, 100,000 doses should be able to be produced in eight weeks. Those are no small asks; other vaccines have taken decades to develop. Ebola, which was part of the impetus for the creation of CEPI, took 12 years to develop and wasn’t available in the necessary quantities when the epidemic hit. CEPI’s first call for proposals focused on three diseases: Middle East Respiratory Syndrome (MERS-CoV), Lassa virus and the Nipah virus. This proposal, however, also “allows a wider aperture to demonstrate proof of concept,” Hatchett said. They will accept proposals from a wider range of solutions in this call, including those that may have less proof of concept data and those that may have some data for other applications, he said. The goal of the financing is to make this area of research and development a more attractive business proposition. CEPI aims to work with researchers to develop or adapt technologies that “can serve the world in emergency.” CEPI will accept initial submissions through Oct. 17, when it will review the first round of proposals. CEPI is hoping that by making the initial proposal shorter, many companies and organizations will apply, Hatchett said. Successful applicants will be asked to submit a more detailed formal proposal, which will be reviewed by the scientific advisory committee before those selected will be recommended to the board. Successful applicants are likely to receive funding by summer 2018. Read more international development news online, and subscribe to The Development Newswire to receive the latest from the world’s leading donors and decision-makers — emailed to you free every business day.