Pharma chief urges transparency in COVID-19 vaccine rollout
20 December, 2020
Pharmaceutical firms must be "very transparent" about the risks and benefits associated with vaccines in efforts to get rid of the COVID-19, the head of Asia's largest drugmaker has told AFP.
Takeda, among the world's biggest pharmaceutical companies, is not developing its vaccine but has contracts with several businesses to distribute their jabs in Japan and is also testing a virus treatment.
"We have to manage the situation well, be very transparent and extremely educative in the way we introduce products," leader Christophe Weber told AFP within an interview.
"Medicines or vaccines should never be perfect ... there are always some unwanted effects," said Weber, who joined Takeda in 2014 and took the top job a year later after practically two decades at Britain's GlaxoSmithKline.
But he's optimistic the industry can describe the risks and benefits properly.
The Frenchman even sees a chance that the inoculation could help rebel the growing tide of uncertainty and outright opposition to vaccination worldwide.
"It'll be interesting to see. Vaccine hesitancy is strong, especially in some countries, but many vaccines are protecting against diseases that persons never see," he said.
"Here it's different, everybody is seeing the impact of the coronavirus ... so that it could actually re-demonstrate the worthiness of vaccines."
Takeda inked a handle japan government and US firm Moderna Therapeutics in October to import and distribute 50 million doses of its vaccine in Japan from the first part of 2021.
Advertisement
The US Food and Drug Administration on Friday granted emergency authorisation for the Moderna jab-- the same permission already granted to the Pfizer/BioNTech version.
Takeda has also signed a manage US biotech firm Novavax to create and deliver its vaccine in Japan, if ongoing clinical trials prove successful.
But the firm - which became one of the world's most significant pharma companies following its 2019 purchase of Ireland's Shire - has decided not to develop its own coronavirus jab.
"When we assessed the problem and the technology that people have in-house, we felt we didn't have the best technology to develop a vaccine," Weber said.
COVID-19 TREATMENT
Japan's pharmaceutical sector has moved comparatively slowly in the race to end the pandemic, even though companies including AnGes, Shionogi and Daiichi Sankyo are now developing vaccines, they aren't expected to be accessible before 2022 at the earliest.
The country has however secured doses from players abroad, including Pfizer and AstraZeneca.
"There is absolutely no leading vaccine player in Japan," said Weber, adding that Takeda hopes to build up for the reason that direction, including with plans for a dengue vaccine.
He believes Japan's biotech sector is less developed than that in the US for the reason that country lacks the "vibrant spin-off mechanism" to help scientific research groups grow into successful start-ups.
"In Japan, scientific research and academia is strong, but there is a lot less in the form of spin-offs and capital raising," he said.
"We need to make more efforts to create this ecosystem in Japan," he added, pointing to an open innovation research facility Takeda founded in 2018 that houses 70 companies, including young biotech firms.
Even though it has shied from coronavirus vaccines, Takeda has been focusing on a plasma therapy to take care of the brand new respiratory disease in collaboration with a global alliance of drug manufacturers.
Called CoVIg-19, the procedure uses concentrated and purified antibodies taken from patients who have battled the coronavirus.
Weber expects clinical trial results for the procedure to be published early next year and says a timeframe for it to hit the marketplace "will all depend on the data".
He's not concerned that the arrival of multiple vaccines renders the procedure irrelevant, warning "we shouldn't drop the ball and assume vaccines will solve everything".
"The vaccines don't possess 100 per cent efficacy," he said, adding that how long they protect for remains unclear and that some patients suffer conditions which prevent them from getting inoculated.
Vaccinating the complete world is also going to be considered a lengthy process, Weber stressed.
"There is still an excellent dependence on efficient treatments."
Source:
TAG(s):