| Insight |
june-july, 2020 | The Health
23
Malaysia-born immunologist in
Australia spearheading Covid-19
vaccine development
By Khirtini K Kumaran
The 51-year-old, who is leading the
research team, said the vaccine would be
“live-attenuated”. It is expected to be highly
effective as it would provide a reliable
cellular and antibody immune responses
against the virus.
“It will mimic the infection of the real
virus but cannot cause disease.And what’s
really fantastic about this vaccine is that
it can induce all arms of the immune
response,” Prof Suresh told The Star.
He also shared the other benefits
of a live-attenuatedvaccine. It has a
proven record for economical large-scale
manufacturing and a well-known
regulatory approval pathway.
At present, they are at the pre-clinical
stage (cell culture and animal testing) and
are aiming to complete this within the
next few months. They are hoping to begin
with human trials soon.
“We expect, if approved, that this
vaccine may reach the market sometime
in late 2021,” he said, adding the team of 13
staff and students was working around the
clock on the vaccine development.
An agreement was signed with
Indian ImmunologicalsLimited (IIL), an
international vaccine pharmaceutical
company, to develop the vaccine.
Speaking on the development, Dr K
Anand Kumar, Managing Director, Indian
Immunologicalssaid: “IIL is committed to
addressing critical public health needs by
engaging in this research collaboration.
The mission at IIL is to develop and supply
vaccines that support the One Health
I am
passionate
about giving
back to the
scientific
community
and get
enormous
satisfaction
from the
scientific
process of
developing
a vaccine for
Covid-19.”
– Prof Suresh
initiative. IIL has taken up this initiative
to develop a vaccine candidate for the
pandemic – Covid-19. IIL’s leadership in
producing safe and affordable human
and veterinary vaccines will enable us to
progress well in this endeavour”.
According to Prof Suresh, the biggest
challenge is identifying the best approach,
such as a live-attenuated vaccine, killed
vaccine or sub-unit protein expression
vaccine.
“One method of vaccine production
doesn’t necessarily work for all types of
diseases.It’s important to consider the
endpoint of a vaccine when embarking
on such an endeavour. Many vaccines do
not make it to final production due to the
approach taken,” he said.
Previously, his lab also developed
and patented novel vaccines for the
chikungunya and Zika viruses.
He said these vaccines were being
developed in collaboration with major
international pharmaceutical companies.
They were expected to submit the
application for conducting clinical trials in
due course.
Prof Suresh noted the most important
thing to learn from the Covid-19 pandemic
was probably the importance of vaccines
and ensuring there was adequate
vaccination within the population.
“I am passionate about giving back
to the scientific community and get
enormous satisfaction from the scientific
process of developing a vaccine for Covid-
19,” he said.
Prof Suresh, who was born in Kuala
Lumpur, grew up in Bandar Pusat Jengka
and has been in Australia for 26 years. — The
Health