AstraZeneca Establishes New Vaccines and Immune Therapies Unit to Advance COVID-19 Portfolio and Pipeline Candidates

On November 9, according to the British media Financial Times, AstraZeneca is establishing a new vaccine and immunotherapy division. In response to the media, AstraZeneca stated that this new team will primarily focus on the COVID-19 vaccine, long-acting antibody combinations, vaccines under development for various diseases, as well as the existing portfolio of respiratory virus products. The leader of the new division is Iskra Reić, AstraZeneca's current Executive Vice President for the Europe and Canada region.

AstraZeneca's adenovirus vaccine Vaxzevria, developed in collaboration with the University of Oxford, faced several setbacks earlier this year, including delays in market entry due to production issues and reports of rare blood clot side effects. As one of the first vaccines globally to enter large-scale production, AstraZeneca's COVID-19 vaccine received approval in Europe in January. However, the blood clot incidents led to temporary suspensions of its use by multiple European countries, and the U.S. has yet to approve the vaccine. Nevertheless, the company previously expressed hopes to seek full FDA approval later this year.

In this year's half-year report, AstraZeneca disclosed that the sales of its COVID-19 vaccine in the first half of the year amounted to $1.136 billion. The company is set to release its third-quarter report on Friday, and the Q3 sales performance of the vaccine will soon be revealed.

The long-acting antibody combination AZD7442 is another promising product in AstraZeneca's COVID-19 pipeline. AZD7442 is a combination of two long-acting antibodies, tixagevimab (AZD8895) and cilgavimab (AZD1061), extracted from the B cells of convalescent patients who were infected with the SARS-CoV-2 virus. Discovered by Vanderbilt University Medical Center in the United States and licensed to AstraZeneca in June 2020. AstraZeneca optimized the neutralizing antibodies using its proprietary YTE half-life extension technology, reducing binding to Fc receptors and complement C1q, allowing a single intramuscular injection to provide up to 12 months of preventive immune protection, which is more than three times longer than typical antibodies.

On August 27 this year, AstraZeneca announced positive results from the Phase III clinical PROVENT study for pre-exposure prophylaxis. Among 5,197 participants, the results showed that AZD7442 reduced the incidence of symptomatic COVID-19 by 77% (95% CI: 46, 90) compared to the control group, becoming the first optimized antibody combination drug (non-vaccine) proven in clinical trials to provide long-acting prevention against COVID-19; no severe or fatal cases due to the coronavirus occurred in the treatment group, whereas the control group reported three severe cases and two deaths. Based on data from two preventive clinical trials, PROVENT and STORMCHASER, AstraZeneca announced on October 5 that it had submitted an application for Emergency Use Authorization to the FDA. This antibody combination is expected to offer protection for populations unsuitable for COVID-19 vaccines and can work alongside vaccines to protect high-risk groups, providing both preventive and therapeutic effects.

Note: The original text has been abridged.