Many of us may not be aware that an important off shoot of covid epidemic is the entry of new class of vaccines called ‘mRNA’. Though invented in 1990, only in 2013 a vaccine based on this platform was made for Ebola – even that did not reach the market as the infection subsided too quickly. Pfizer-BioNTech’s covid-19 vaccine was the first of its genre to be authorised for vaccination worldwide.
Though it was a new technology, it was the first vaccine to get regulatory clearance: BioNTech took less than a year from concept to commercialisation! The vaccines of conventional type (attenuated, adeno, etc.,) took much longer to hit the market! The reason could be, It is much safer to manufacture as it does not involve handling live viruses and hence may not need bio safety laboratories like the ones for the others!
BioNTech, the then anonymous German company founded by Turkish (couple) immigrants Dr Ozlem Tureci and Dr Ugur Sahin in 2008, is involved in treating cancers by provoking body to make antibodies to fight the cancer cells through this mRNA technology! And it is patient specific – designer mRNA medicine! Dr Ugur caught the idea of mRNA based vaccine while reading about the then ‘epidemic’ in Wuhan and the paper that published the genetic code of virus in Jan 2020. The couple relentlessly pursued their idea, converting their modest cancer immunotherapy facility into making the vaccine. By Dec 2020 their (over)ambition became a reality when the massive global vaccination program was rolled out with UK’s grand old Mrs Keen, being the first one to lead – she took the first vaccine shot. This small company beat the pharma giants Moderna of US, Sanofi of France, that were also pursuing the same technology!
An extremely small unknown entity that was worth less than half a billion$ in early 2019 hit the roof with a net worth of over 27 billion by mid 2020. Not just that, the realisation, that gloomy world that has locked itself down, could open its wings, lifted the indices all around! World Economy back on rails!
When the company struggled to make the vaccine in 2020, no outside help came either from institutions or nations! ‘Operation warp speed’ was mired with US presidential election controversies, with Trump blaming an intentional delay of approval of vaccines. This cast aspersions on the regulatory body! And hence no money from US! EU could not place advance purchase orders due to difference of opinion among the member states! UK funded its own Oxford program but not the Germans! Brexit politics!!No funding from Gates’ covax program too!! Only wealthy small nations like Israel and Singapore placed advance purchased orders for their citizens! Sheer pursuit of excellence in science kept the team going!
Luckily Pfizer partnered in the mission and strengthened the massive phase-3 trials and augmented the production capacities, which the tiny company could anyway not cope up with!
This is the story of a small, Cancer immunotherapy company, becaming a vaccine behemoth!
ULTIMATELY SCIENCE HAS INDEED WON!
Nattu’s Page 