Bharat Biotech completes Phase-3 trials for first intranasal Covid vaccine and booster
Aditi Tandon
New Delhi, August 15
Bharat Biotech on Monday announced that BBV154, India’s first intranasal Covid vaccine had proven to be safe, well-tolerated, and immunogenic in subjects in controlled clinical trials.
BBV154 is a recombinant replication-deficient adenovirus vectored vaccine with a pre-fusion stabilised spike protein.
In two separate trials the vaccine was found safe as a primary two dose schedule and a heterologous booster dose to those who have received primary vaccines.
Biotech said this vaccine candidate was evaluated earlier in Phase-I and II clinical trials with successful results.
“BBV154 has been specifically formulated to allow intranasal delivery. In addition, the nasal delivery system has been designed and developed to be cost-effective in low and middle-income countries,” said the firm after submitting data to the drug regulator.
BBV154 was developed in partnership with Washington University St Louis, which had designed and developed the recombinant adenoviral vectored constructs and evaluated them in preclinical studies for efficacy.
Product development related to preclinical safety evaluation, large-scale manufacturing scale-up, formulation, and delivery device development, including human clinical trials, were conducted by Bharat Biotech.
The Government of India partly funded product development and clinical trials through the Department of Biotechnology’s, COVID Suraksha program.
Two separate and simultaneous clinical trials were conducted to evaluate BBV154 as a primary dose (2-dose) schedule and a heterologous booster dose for subjects who have previously received 2 doses of the two commonly administered covid vaccines in India.
Immunogenicity was evaluated through serum neutralizing antibodies. To assess vaccine response through the intranasal route, secretory antibodies were evaluated by ELISA in serum and saliva.
Evaluation was also carried out for the ability of BBV154 to elicit long term memory T and B cell responses against the ancestral and omicron variants.
Suchitra K. Ella, Joint Managing Director, Bharat Biotech, said, “On this 75th Independence Day, we are proud to announce successful completion of clinical trials for BBV154 intranasal vaccine. We stay committed and focused on innovation and product development; this is yet another achievement for the multidisciplinary teams at Bharat Biotech. If approved, this intranasal vaccine will make it easier to deploy in mass immunization campaigns with an easy to administer formulation and delivery device. Vectored vaccines also enable faster development of targeted vaccines in response to emerging variants of concern. We hereby thank the volunteers, principle investigators, and clinical trial personnel for all their efforts.”
BBV154 has the double benefit of enabling faster development of variant-specific vaccines and easy nasal delivery that helps mass immunization protect from emerging concern variants. It promises to become an important tool in mass vaccinations during pandemics and endemics.
BBV154 is stable at 2-8°C for easy storage and distribution. Bharat Biotech has established large manufacturing capabilities at multiple sites across India, including Gujarat, Karnataka, Maharashtra and Telangana, with operations pan India.
