Nano Covax third-stage clinical trial starts

Deputy Minister of Health Tran Van Thuan has signed the approval to launch the third stage of the clinical trial of made-in-Vietnam Nano Covax Covid-19 vaccine.

Deputy Minister of Health Tran Van Thuan on June 11 signed the approval to launch the third stage of the clinical trial of made-in-Vietnam Nano Covax Covid-19 vaccine.

  

Minister of Health Nguyen Thanh Long and Minister of Defence Phan Van Giang visit the volunteers

The third stage will be carried out on 13,000 volunteers at various places in Vietnam including the Military Medical University in Hung Yen Province, Pasteur Institute in HCM City and in Long An and Tien Giang provinces.

The Military Medical University planned to vaccinate 1,000 volunteers in the first stage. Over 6,000 volunteers have registered at the Military Medical University. After medical screening, 600 people met the requirements for the trial. The volunteers will be divided into two groups. One group will be given a 25mcg dose of vaccine and the other will be given a placebo, a harmless substance.

Nano Covax which is developed by Nanagen is the most promising Covid-19 vaccine made in Vietnam. The Covivac vaccine developed by Ivac is in preparation for the second stage of the clinical trial.

Nano Covax was developed in May 2020 and the clinical trial was started seven months later.

In the second phase, Nano Covax was given to 554 volunteers, 109 of them are over 60 years old. The volunteers were divided into four groups and were given a 25mcg, 50mcg, 75mcg dose and placebo for each group. The vaccine proved to be safe and no emergency cases were reported.

Vietnam has the capacity to make six million doses of Nano Covax per month and the capacity can be raised to 100 million doses. It's likely that Vietnam will issue an emergency permit to produce the Nano Cova vaccine in 2021.