New Covid-19 vaccine Valneva as effective as AstraZeneca vaccine against Coronavirus, check details

Even as a substantial population of the world has been vaccinated against Coronavirus, pharma companies and scientists are developing newer vaccines and the latest entrant is a vaccine developed by the French pharma major Valneva SE. The vaccine officially named VLA2001 recently completed its phase 3 clinical trials and the company has announced that its vaccine is as effective as Oxford University-AstraZeneca developed Coronavirus vaccine, the Indian Express reported.

VLA2001 vaccine
The Valneva Coronavirus vaccine is an inactivated adjuvanted Coronavirus vaccine which uses the inactive or killed particles of Sars-CoV-2 virus to trigger immune response in the human body. The virus is made inactive or killed by chemicals or radiation and does not have the potential to infect a human body and instead generates strong immunity against the disease. Adam Finn who is a Professor of Paediatrics at the University of Bristol and was the TrialChief Investigator for the vaccine candidate said in a press release that Valneva SE has used a much more traditional approach than the other Coronavirus vaccine candidates that are currently in use in most parts of the world. Finn further said that the vaccine will aid the fight against the Coronavirus pandemic.

Valneva’s Coronavirus vaccine is not the sole inactivated virus type vaccine against Coronavirus as India’s indigenous vaccine Covaxin has also relied on the same technique to evoke strong immunity against the disease. What makes the Valneva vaccine significant is the fact that it can be stored in a normal refrigerator unlike many Coronavirus vaccines like Pfizer’s and Moderna’s which require severely low temperature conditions for effective storage of the vaccines. The simple storage requirement of the Valneva vaccine could come to use extensively in low-income and poor countries which often lack expensive and state of the art logistics chains.

Efficacy of Valneva vaccine
The phase 3 clinical trials of the vaccine had included more than 4000 participants over and above 18 years of age. The clinical trials of phase 3 were conducted simultaneously at 26 different places in the United Kingdom. Close to 3000 participants aged above 30 were administered with two doses of either Valneva vaccine or Oxford University-AstraZeneca vaccine. The other 1000 participants aged between 18 and 29 years were administered with two doses of Valneva vaccine after a gap of 28 days.

The results showed that after the passage of two weeks, the Valneva vaccine was able to trigger higher immune response in participants aged above 30 as compared to AstraZeneca vaccine. The participants who were administered with the Valneva vaccine also reported significantly less number of adverse events as compared to participants jabbed with AstraZeneca vaccine. The company will soon submit the clinical trial data to the regulators and expects an approval before the end of the year.