A Bangladeshi firm claims to have developed a COVID-19 vaccine that worked successfully in preliminary animal trial.

‘Our engineered antigen and formulation are producing high affinity antibody in animal model against COVID-19 spike protein,’ said Asif Mahmud, in-charge of research and development section of Globe Biotech on Tuesday.

‘We’ve concluded the animal-model preliminary trial and now we will go for regulated animal trial,’ he said at a press conference in Dhaka.

The preliminary trial was done on three rabbits in a level 3 biosafety lab, he added.

‘We will seek ethical approval from Bangladesh Medical Research Council for clinical trial after the regulated animal trial,’ he added.

‘We are here to announce that we are well in the race of COVID-19 vaccine development,’ said Asif, adding, they were yet to apply for patent or make any arrangement for the publication of their effort.

‘It’s a big day for us and for the nation,’ said Harunur Rashid, chairman of Globe Biotech, a concern of Globe Pharma.

‘We have the capacity to produce 7 million vials of the vaccine if finally get market authorisation from the Directorate General of Drug Administration,’ he said.

Established in 2015, Globe Biotech has no product in its profile.

It has six pipe-line products, including two for cancer, under the review of the BMRC, said Harun.

They started the analysis of COVID-19 genome sequence in March and concluded the preliminary animal trial of the vaccine in June.

BMRC and DGDA officials said they were unaware about the Globe Biotech’s efforts.

Although no vaccine has completed clinical trials, there are multiple efforts in progress to develop such a vaccine.

In February 2020, the World Health Organisation said that it did not expect a vaccine against severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2), the causative virus, to become available in less than 18 months.

By late June 2020, 194 vaccine candidates were in development, with 15 in human testing: two in Phase II efficacy and dose-testing studies in human subjects, five in Phase I–II safety and efficacy trials, and eight in Phase I trials, according to the World Health Organisation and global media reports.

AstraZeneca sponsored initiatives at the University of Oxford, Chinese Institute of Biotechnology of the Academy of Military Medical Sciences sponsored CanSino Biologics and the US National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases sponsored Moderna are doing well in the vaccine race.