Novavax, Inc
Novavax, Inc. is a US vaccine development company headquartered in Gaithersburg, Maryland, with additional facilities in Rockville, Maryland and Uppsala, Sweden. In 2020, the company will undergo Phase III clinical testing of adults for its candidate vaccines for seasonal flu, NanoFlu and candidate vaccines for COVID-19 prevention.
Coronavirus: what we know about the Novavax vaccine
On March 11, 2021, Novavax reported that its COVID-19 vaccine is 96% efficacious in reducing mild, moderate or severe disease. The Maryland-based company joins the handful of manufacturers that have reported encouraging data on a COVID-19 vaccine; three, Pfizer-BioNTech, Moderna and Johnson & Johnson’s Janssen Pharmaceuticals, have already received emergency use authorization for their shots from the U.S. Food and Drug Administration.
Before that, on Thursday, January, 28, 2021, the Novavax’s company CEO Stanley Erck, said that their vaccine would be 89.3% effective, according to clinical trials conducted by the American biotechnology company Novavax. “NVX-CoV2373 has the potential to play an important role in solving this global public health crisis”.
In detail, its effectiveness was estimated at 95.6% against the initial strain and at 85.6% against the British variant. The only downside is that it is less for the South African mutation (49.4%). The company said it is immediately embarking on the development of a new vaccine targeting this variant.
How does the Novavax vaccine work? Unlike the vaccines from Pfizer and Moderna, which use messenger RNA technology, biotech has developed a so-called “subunit” recombinant version, which also requires two injections 3 weeks apart. The virus has spikes (viral proteins) on its surface to come into contact with the cells to be infected. The injection of the Novavax vaccine thus comprises fragments of the coronavirus which make it possible to provoke an immune response in the human body.
Read also: Covid Vaccines | What Vaccines Are Used In The World?
Novavax stock (NVAX)
Over the last couple of months, COVID-19 vaccines developed by Moderna (NASDAQ:MRNA) and Pfizer (NYSE:PFE) along with its partner BioNTech (NASDAQ:BNTX) have been at the center of attention. The two vaccines received emergency use authorization (EUA) in the U.S., U.K., European Union, and other countries. They’ve already been given to millions of people.
Look out, Pfizer and Moderna: Here comes Novavax (NASDAQ:NVAX).
History
Created in 1987, it was listed on the Nasdaq in December 1995 thanks to the merger with Lipovax. It then had a particularly turbulent stock market course3.
In 2002, the FDA approved its adjuvant Extrasorb.
In June 2013, it acquired the Swedish company Isconova AB, which it renamed Novavax AB, and which provided it with a new adjuvant manufacturing technology called Matrix-M.
The development of a vaccine against the respiratory syncytial virus, called ResVax, began in 2008, but in 2016 the project experienced a first clinical failure in phase III. The company nevertheless decides to persist in putting ResVax on the market by modifying the dosages. But in 2019 this vaccine was to fail again in clinical trials.
At the same time, studies are being conducted on a promising influenza vaccine, NanoFlu, and another against the Zika virus.
Photo credit: Wikimedia Commons
