Viruses that have historically put humanity at the greatest risk come from around 25 viral families and have the potential to produce the next pandemic. Names like influenza, SARS and Ebola are familiar to us but it is also important to track the less well-known threats.
Sabine Kuratli, CMC Lead at CEPI, revealed that her company’s mission is to enhance pandemic and epidemic preparedness. CEPI is a global partnership of public, private and philanthropic organisations seeking to prevent pandemics before they become global threats.
The core focus of the company is to fulfil the 100-day vaccine mission, which aims to make safe, effective, and accessible vaccines available within 100 days of identifying a new pathogen. During the COVID-19 pandemic, it took 326 days to develop the vaccines, which is still impressive, but by this point, 68 million cases had been reported and many lives were lost.
To achieve the 100-day mission, Kuratli highlighted the need to invest in flexible, scalable manufacturing, rapid release analytics and technologies, including thermal, stable formulations. It is critical that they are affordable and accessible to citizens on a global scale. Therefore, CEPI is actively scouting for innovations that can strengthen and accelerate responses to future outbreaks.
Currently, CEPI is supporting 16 active CMC projects across the areas of thermal stability, speed, scale and access. These projects bring in new technologies which are pushed through a technical proof of concept and then select and integrate the most promising innovations into real world vaccine programs. RNA is a promising platform but still faces challenges with poor thermal stability, limited access and IP restrictions. So, CEPI is funding innovations to make RNA vaccines more stable, affordable, and globally accessible.
Kuratli briefly outlined some of the collaborations that CEPI participates in. There is a particular emphasis on ensuring equitable access in the global south. CEPI is open to partnerships around the world across many different sectors in both academia and industry, and Kuratli concluded her presentation by inviting the audience to collaborate with them.
