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The revolution is over
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Vaccine-makers and Ebola
IN MAY 2013 GlaxoSmithKline (GSK), a British pharmaceuticals firm, bought a small Swiss vaccine-maker for $325m. It acquired Okairos because it had the technology to create vaccines that stimulate stronger than normal immune responses. In a press release Okairos said the deal included a “small number of early-stage assets”.
That passing remark turned out to be a big deal. What GSK had paid for included a preclinical Ebola vaccine candidate, and in March this year it contacted the World Health Organisation (WHO) to let it know what it had. The WHO told GSK at first that its focus was on implementing disease-control protocols, and it was not until August that the company was asked to accelerate work on its vaccine.
The pharmaceutical industry has long neglected vaccines, not least because they are mostly needed by countries too poor to pay much for them. However, as concern about the current Ebola outbreak has grown, work on several candidates has been stepped up. This has involved unprecedented collaboration between …Original Article
