Vaccines against Covid-19: the British government cancels its orders from the Franco-Austrian laboratory Valneva

The Franco-Austrian laboratory Valneva announced, Monday, September 13, to have “Received a notice of termination” from the UK government regarding “Supply agreement” of its candidate vaccine against Covid-19.

“The contract includes a clause allowing the British government to terminate it. He further claims that Valneva failed in his obligations, which Valneva vigorously contests “, informed, without further details, the laboratory in a press release. While discussions with the European Union had stumbled in April, the United Kingdom had ordered 100 million doses for 2021-2022.

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Valneva uses a vaccine with deactivated virus, a technology more traditional than the messenger RNA of the products of Pfizer-BioNTech and Moderna, and which is used in particular for the vaccines against the flu each year. The laboratory had submitted its request for authorization to the British health authorities in August. Valneva had thus declared at the end of August that he hoped, on the basis of the phase I and II trials, “Have a vaccine that is more than 80% effective”. “It will have to be demonstrated in the phase III trial”, then insisted its managing director, Franck Grimaud.

Initial marketing authorization at the end of 2021

“Valneva has worked tirelessly, and invested to the maximum of its abilities, in its collaboration with [le gouvernement britannique], in particular by committing significant resources and showing very strong involvement in order to respond to [ses] requests for vaccines suitable for variants ”, the laboratory argued again on Monday. The latter also makes it known that he “Continue to be fully engaged in development” of its vaccine candidate, VLA2001, and that it “Will increase its efforts with other potential customers to ensure that its inactivated vaccine can be used in the fight against the pandemic”.

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Valneva recalls that the results of the phase III trials “Are expected at the start of the fourth quarter”. These results “Will be part of the progressive submission of the conditional authorization application dossier for VLA2001 to the UK health agency. Subject to phase III results and UK health agency approval ”, Valneva believes that an initial marketing authorization could be obtained at the end of this year.

The World with AFP

www.lemonde.fr

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