A senior official for American biotech company Novavax said the company is committed to equitable COVID-19 vaccine allocation and has made a “great effort” to manufacture its vaccine in different sites across the globe. However, whether its vaccine will be used as booster shots or prioritized in countries struggling with supply will be up to policymakers, he said.
Speaking at a Devex event held on the sidelines of the 76th United Nations General Assembly, John Trizzino, executive vice president at Novavax, said policymakers are responsible for determining how the COVID-19 doses will be used.
“We've taken our responsibility seriously in making [COVID-19 vaccine] doses available across the globe. Now, it's up to a variety of policymakers to decide where and how those are prioritized,” he said.
All you need to know from UNGA 2021
To get on-the-ground coverage, in-depth analysis, and behind-the-scenes reporting from the 76th U.N. General Assembly, sign up for our special edition newsletters.
Novavax’s COVID-19 vaccine is currently being manufactured in over 20 facilities globally, including at the Serum Institute of India. Novavax has received up to $388 million in funding from the Coalition for Epidemic Preparedness Innovations to accelerate early-stage clinical trials as well as large-scale manufacturing of its vaccine.
Trizzino said the company’s partnership with SII is “an additional reflection” of its commitment to equitable vaccine allocation “knowing that Serum’s expertise is in large-scale manufacturing and moving product logistically into low- and middle-income countries.”
SII is expected to provide a large portion of the 1.1 billion doses of Novavax vaccine to COVAX, as part of a memorandum of understanding between Novavax and Gavi, the Vaccine Alliance signed in February.
Novavax, however, remains opposed to a patent waiver on COVID-19 products.
“We do oppose the TRIPS waiver and … not because we're not in support of equitable allocation, and not because we don't believe that doses need to go into low-income countries with some priority, but because manufacturing a complicated biological [vaccine] like we have is not like making aspirin,” Trizzino said. “You just don't give the recipe to somebody and they turn around and it can easily manufacture that product the next day.”
He said the company is continuously looking at other opportunities to expand its manufacturing capacity.
“We're eager to manufacture as much product as we can. But again, as we go and kind of do our due diligence around the globe, we're being very selective about where that manufacturing is being done,” he said.
Coinciding with the 76th annual U.N. General Assembly, Devex will convene U.N. agency heads, government leaders, development practitioners, and private sector actors to discuss the most effective ways to build back better. Register here for our daily events.
Novavax expects to produce 2 billion doses of its COVID-19 vaccine in 2022 and to file for emergency approval for its vaccine within the year. In addition to scaling up manufacturing and getting robust clinical data for its vaccine, the company had to also demonstrate manufacturing consistency across its sites around the world.
But Trizzino said the company has been in constant communication with regulatory authorities, providing them with the data as it becomes available.
SII and Novavax have filed regulatory submissions for emergency use authorization of the Novavax vaccine in India, Indonesia, and the Philippines.
“And so, therefore, we're now at a point in time, at which all that feedback and all that conversation has been incorporated into these documents, so we should be seeing a coordinated effort of getting these very similar regulatory filings being submitted within the next couple of months,” he said.
About the author
Jenny Lei Ravelo@JennyLeiRavelo
Jenny Lei Ravelo is a Devex Senior Reporter based in Manila. She covers global health, with a particular focus on the World Health Organization, and other development and humanitarian aid trends in Asia Pacific. Prior to Devex, she wrote for ABS-CBN, one of the largest broadcasting networks in the Philippines, and was a copy editor for various international scientific journals. She received her journalism degree from the University of Santo Tomas.