{"id":193198,"date":"2021-06-25T09:43:02","date_gmt":"2021-06-25T07:43:02","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/sa-to-play-a-leading-role-in-africas-first-vaccine-manufacturing-hub\/"},"modified":"2021-06-25T09:43:02","modified_gmt":"2021-06-25T07:43:02","slug":"sa-to-play-a-leading-role-in-africas-first-vaccine-manufacturing-hub","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/sa-to-play-a-leading-role-in-africas-first-vaccine-manufacturing-hub\/","title":{"rendered":"SA to play a leading role in Africa\u2019s first vaccine manufacturing hub"},"content":{"rendered":"
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South Africa will play a leading role in the pre-clinical research phase of Africa\u2019s first messenger RNA (mRNA) technology transfer hub for COVID-19 vaccines.<\/p>\n

This according to the South African Medical Research Council (SAMRC) that welcomed the move that President Cyril Ramaphosa has hailed as a landmark initiative.<\/p>\n

This comes after the World Health Organisation (WHO), together with the South African and French governments announced that the country would host what is to be Africa\u2019s COVID-19 vaccine production facility.<\/p>\n

SAnews<\/em><\/strong> reported early this week that the \u201ctech transfer hub\u201d will pave a way for African companies to begin manufacturing mRNA vaccines.<\/p>\n

The mRNA technology instructs cells to make a protein that generates an immune response in the body, producing antibodies that protect against disease, a key ingredient in Pfizer\/BioNTech and Moderna COVID-19 vaccines.<\/p>\n

The SAMRC said experts have described the mRNA technology as a viable alternative to the traditional vaccine platforms.<\/p>\n

\u201cThis is not only because they have been shown to be more effective but also due to their capacity for rapid development, and their potential for low-cost manufacture. Furthermore, the mRNA vaccines were considered some of the most efficacious vaccines for COVID-19.\u201d<\/p>\n

As part of the bid process, SAMRC said it joined forces with five top local universities, Biovac and Afrigen to create a sustainable technology and knowledge hub including Africa Centres for Disease Control and Prevention (Africa CDC).<\/p>\n

The hub will work with a team of excellent scientists from the Witwatersrand University, University of Cape Town, University of KwaZulu-Natal, University of Stellenbosch and the North-West University, with the Afrigen group.<\/p>\n

The consortium aims to bring to clinical trial a COVID-19 vaccine in 12 months, as proof of concept.<\/p>\n

In addition, the medical research organisation said the goal is to manufacture and distribute locally developed vaccines for Africa-specific COVID variants, as well as future pathogens threatening the health of people on the continent.<\/p>\n

SAMRC President and Chief Executive Officer, Professor Glenda Gray, believes that the organisation has a \u201ctraceable\u201d national footprint and proven leadership role in supporting technology development, which may prove to be valuable.<\/p>\n

Meanwhile, the SAMRC\u2019s Professor Richard Gordon said: \u201cThe announcement was an important first step to establish the mRNA technology in Africa which can allow the continent to leap-frog the vaccine manufacturing gap\u201d.   <\/p>\n

The hub is also expected to strengthen the genomic surveillance for new variants, as well as start the development of novel vaccine candidates for testing.<\/p>\n

According to the SAMRC, the preclinical research capability \u2013 one of the critical elements in the establishment of drug development and a pharmaceutical industry \u2013 is already in development as well as the laboratory system to evaluate the effectiveness of vaccines.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe candidate vaccine will be manufactured at the Afrigen facilities and the full-scale commercial production will be at Biovac,\u201d SAMRC explained.<\/p>\n

Professor Patrick Arbuthnot from the Wits\/SAMRC Antiviral Gene Therapy Research Unit (AGTRU) said repurposing the technology to counter COVID-19 is a significant activity of the unit.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe intention is for these hubs to enable the establishment of production processes at an industrial or semi-industrial level permitting training and provision of all necessary standard operating procedures for production and quality control,\u201d he added. \u2013 SAnews.gov.za<\/strong><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

South Africa will play a leading role in the pre-clinical research phase of Africa\u2019s first messenger RNA (mRNA) technology transfer hub for COVID-19 vaccines. This according to the South African Medical Research Council (SAMRC) that welcomed the move that President Cyril Ramaphosa has hailed as a landmark initiative. This comes after the World Health Organisation […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":193199,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_genesis_hide_title":false,"_genesis_hide_breadcrumbs":false,"_genesis_hide_singular_image":false,"_genesis_hide_footer_widgets":false,"_genesis_custom_body_class":"","_genesis_custom_post_class":"","_genesis_layout":"","ngg_post_thumbnail":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[1],"tags":[38678],"class_list":{"0":"post-193198","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-south-africa","8":"tag-sanews","9":"entry"},"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/06\/sa-to-play-a-leading-role-in-africas-first-vaccine-manufacturing-hub.jpg","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/193198","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=193198"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/193198\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/193199"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=193198"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=193198"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=193198"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}