UMN's novel flu vaccine positive in early trial
This article was originally published in Scrip
Executive Summary
The Japanese venture UMN Pharmahas reported positive results from a Phase I/II trial with its novel pandemic flu vaccine UMN-0501. The company said responses had been observed in the low dose trial in 125 healthy male subjects, including with a non-aluminum adjuvant formulation, with no serious adverse reactions. It is now planning a larger Phase II trial at higher doses this year. The recombinant vaccine is manufactured using a baculovirus expression vector system and cultured insect cells to express the target haemagglutinin protein. This enables production times to be cut to around eight weeks, from six months or so for traditional egg-based methods (Scrip Online, June 11th, 2008). UMN-0501 already has orphan status in Japan.