Life threatening diarrhoea, popularly known as Delhi Belly, could soon be prevented. The new vaccination for treating bacteria enterotoxigenic e.coli (ETEC), which infects the children (mostly), who are traveling to the developing countries, is in its research stage. The bacterial infection, also known as traveller’s diarrhoea, kills about 1,57,000 people annually.
Davinder Gill, chief executive officer at Hilleman Laboratories, a non-profit joint venture of pharmaceutical major Merck, Sharp & Dohme and UK-based Wellcome Trust, which is working on ETEC vaccine, spoke to Businessworld on various issues. Edited excerpts:
Which are the vaccinations that are in the development pipeline? Are we getting closer to find the solutions for deadly diseases like Zika Virus? We have four additional vaccines in our development pipeline, two of which are at the middle stages of clinical testing– heat stable rotavirus vaccine and oral cholera vaccine. In addition, we have a meningitis vaccine for invasive meningococcal disease that is finishing preclinical work and a vaccine for Enterotoxigenic E.Coli (ETEC) for severe diarrhoea that is in the research stage.
Hilleman Labs in not working on Zika vaccine but several groups including some in India have made good progress. Recently, WHO announced that a Zika virus vaccine developed by NIH in the USA and by Bharat Biotech in India were the most advanced candidates.
There is a fall in number of clinical trials conducted in India due to the strict guidelines. What is your experience with getting clinical trials done in India? Yes, this has been true in the past, but recently we have seen significant change. Backlog of clinical trial approvals has been cleared. Also the DCGI has strengthened its staff through additional manpower and training. Together, this is improving the clinical trials landscape in India. Government agencies should work closely with private sector to identify and address key issues and make sure decisions are made in a way that is beneficial to all stakeholders.
Vaccinations for kids, to an extent, have become part of schedule in urban India. Are we serious enough for adult vaccines?The adult vaccine market in India is very small compared to the paediatric market, however, exact sales figures are not available. But adult vaccination is extremely important. There are some cases where there is documented evidence of disease transmission from adults to children. Therefore, it becomes crucial to vaccinate and protect our population against all age groups. In this regard, awareness on the importance of vaccines is extremely important. We have to educate our masses, especially those living in rural areas and in urban slums, on the myths and facts about vaccines and vaccinations.
What are your focus areas while deciding on the categories for research? Our goal is to be become financially independent and sustainable. Our main focus areas are to optimize existing vaccines for the needs of the developing world, for instance, our heat stable rota virus vaccine and our oral cholera vaccine. Our focus is also to develop new vaccines in diseases where currently there is no approved vaccines (such as ETEC and Shigella). We have also developed important vaccine technologies that are useful for other vaccine products.
How do you balance the fight between quality and affordability, considering the stressed budgets?In the case of vaccines, quality (and therefore safety) can never be compromised at any cost. We have found ways in which we can make vaccine production cheaper, sample is our meningitis vaccine, without compromising safety. In India, finding right partners for investments in vaccine area remains a challenge due to high development costs, long product development cycle and high risks of failure.
