Open Orphan PLC (LON:ORPH) said the first volunteer has been dosed with a new needle-free, nasally-administered coronavirus (COVID-19) vaccine.
The phase I trial of the next-generation single-dose inoculation will take place at the company’s hVIVO’s facility, a specialist centre for human challenge studies.
The advance has been developed by a US company called Codagenix and will be subject to a randomised, double-blind, placebo-controlled dose-escalation assessment.
This will evaluate the safety and tolerability of the single-dose intranasal vaccine candidate in 48 healthy young adult volunteers at hVIVO's state-of-the-art centre in Whitechapel, London.
"We are delighted to have been chosen by the New York-based Codagenix to run this very important COVID-19 vaccine study in our quarantine clinic in London,” said Open Orphan chairman, Cathal Friel in a statement.
“This vaccine is one of the first of the next generation COVID-19 vaccines, it is a single dose, needle-free, intranasal, live attenuated COVID-19 virus vaccine. Thus, in our opinion, because it is a live attenuated virus vaccine, COVI-VAC has the potential to give much longer-lasting cellular immunity against COVID-19 than many of the first-generation vaccines.”
Friel said Codagenix sought an inpatient facility for the first-in-human evaluation “to allow for a thorough evaluation of product safety and real-time volunteer monitoring.”
“Our unique state-of-the-art quarantine facility in East London is one of the few facilities in the world suitable to conduct this trial safely and successfully,” he added.