WHO refuses emergency use authorisation to first homegrown Canadian vax
The World Health Organization (WHO) has refused emergency use authorisation to the first homegrown Canadian Covid-19 vaccine due to the manufacturer’s links to a tobacco major.
Canadian media reported on Friday that the WHO had not accepted the application from Medicago for its candidate Covifenz, which was approved in Canada on February 24. Among the main shareholders of Medicago, which is headquartered in Quebec City, is Philip Morris, the global tobacco company.
Covifenz is a unique vaccine, the first shot that utilises a plant-based platform, and the agency Canadian Press reported that the virus-like particles are cultured in a plant related to tobacco.
Medicago president and CEO Takashi Nagao said in a statement cited by the outlet Global News, “It is our understanding that this decision is linked to Medicago’s minority shareholder and not the demonstrated safety and efficacy profile of our Covid-19 vaccine.”
WHO has updated the status of the application to ‘Not accepted’.
At the time the vaccine was cleared in Canada, it showed a 71% efficacy against variants of Covid-19. However, the jab, so far, has only been authorised for use by Canada and nowhere else in the world. It had applied for the EUA from Health Canada in April last year. It was, and remains, the sixth vaccine approved for use in Canada, joining those made by Pfizer-BioNTech, Moderna, AstraZeneca, Johnson & Johnson, and Novovax. Health Canada has yet to give EUA for Covaxin, made by Bharat Biotech and its American partner Ocugen and its Canadian subsidiary Vaccigen.
Its development was heavily backed by the Canadian government. In October 2020, Prime Minister Justin Trudeau announced that Ottawa would invest up to 173 million Canadian dollars ($138 million) into Medicago for this purpose through the Strategic Innovation Fund “to support Canada’s response to Covid-19 and future preparedness”.
At that time, the government also announced it had entered into an agreement for Medicago to supply 76 million doses of its vaccine. That shot is expected to become available this May.