Recent reports from a international pharmaceutical firm, suggests a vaccine for dengue fever could be made available as early as 2015.
Mr. Guillaume Leroy, the vice president of the French firm Sanofi Pasteur, made the announcement during a dengue forum over the weekend, which was held by the Association of Southeast Asian Nations.
Mr. Leroy told delegates that the information related to the vaccine, being CYD (chimeric yellow fever) dengue vaccine, will be completed sometime this year. Mr. Leroy also said, Sanofi will start applying for licenses with the health authorities of affected countries as soon as possible. We will submit all the data to health authorities in 2015 to obtain the first licenses. As soon as we have these licenses during late 2015 or early 2016, we will be able to supply the vaccine. Mr. Leroy went on to say, while the World Health Organization (WHO) issues the guidelines for vaccines, the health authorities of individual countries are ultimately responsible for licensing the sale of vaccines and medicines in their territories.
Dr. Rosario Capeding, head of the dengue research program of the DOH Research Institute for Tropical Medicine (RITM), reported that the late-stage (Phase 3) study of Sanofi Pasteur’s candidate vaccine indicated a reduction of dengue cases by 56 percent. Capeding said the study, which involved 10,275 healthy children across southeast Asia, including Cebu City and San Pablo City in Laguna in the Philippines; Bali and West Java in Indonesia; Kuala Lumpur and Penang in Malaysia; Kamphaeng Phet and Ratchaburi in Thailand; plus Long Xuen City and My Tho City in Vietnam. The World Health Organization will provide an independent assessment once the results of a detailed study are made available.
