500 Greater Manchester volunteers to take part in new COVID-19 vaccine study
Five-hundred Greater Manchester and East Cheshire volunteers will from today be invited to join a leading phase three COVID-19 vaccine study taking place in the region.
The study will test the safety and effectiveness of a promising new vaccine, developed by US biotechnology company Novavax, across a broad spectrum of people, including those from a variety age groups and backgrounds. Phase 3 studies involve many thousands of people, giving researchers insights into the effects of a vaccine on a much larger population than phase 1 and 2 studies.
Stockport NHS Foundation Trust is among the sites selected to undertake the Novavax study. It will be carried out in a community setting, in cooperation with the National Institute for Health Research (NIHR) Clinical Research Network (CRN) Greater Manchester.
Calling on some of the thousands of volunteers who have joined the fight against COVID-19 by signing-up to the NHS Vaccine Registry, the phase three trials are the second to commence in the UK.
A total of 10,000 volunteers are needed to take part in the trials which will also be undertaken at a number of NIHR regional sites across the UK, including Lancashire, the Midlands, London, Glasgow and Belfast.
At Stockport, 500 volunteers are needed. Volunteers who sign up to the Registry and live in Stockport, East Cheshire and South East Manchester could potentially take part.
The Registry was launched in July to help create a database of people who consent to be contacted by the NHS to take part in clinical studies, to help speed up the development of a safe and effective vaccine.
More than 250,000 people nationally have now signed up, including 26,785 in the North West and 11,955 in Greater Manchester and East Cheshire. [data on the number of sign-ups in each local authority area is available here].
With several more studies for potential vaccine candidates expected to start before the end of the year, UK researchers are calling for additional volunteers to sign up to take part in research. To better understand the effectiveness of vaccine candidates and help find a vaccine that works for as many people as soon as possible, researchers are particularly seeking more volunteers from Black, Asian and minority ethnic backgrounds as well as those with underlying health conditions and the over 65s.
Professor Andrew Ustianowski, NIHR Clinical Research Network (CRN) national specialty lead for Infection and NIHR CRN Greater Manchester Deputy Clinical Director, said:
“This launch represents a landmark in the fight against COVID-19 and our Greater Manchester research community is proud to be contributing to this important vaccine study.
“We are really grateful to the thousands of people who have signed up to the vaccine registry so far. It is important we keep this up and that more people from across our range of Greater Manchester communities join the registry because we are going to need large numbers of volunteers to get involved in testing the vaccines.
“We need a really good mix of people of different ages and ethnicities, and people with and without existing health problems. This will help identify vaccines that work for everyone.”
Dr David Baxter, Principal Investigator for the trial at Stockport NHS Foundation Trust, said:
“COVID-19 has had a huge impact on our lives and we have seen many, many deaths with serious long-term illnesses in survivors. An effective and safe vaccine promises a more long lasting solution and we are really pleased to be part of this national study of Novavax.
“The vaccine has successfully passed phases I and II and this phase III study well answer the questions about its safety and effectiveness for all of us. It is vital we carry out this vaccine trial and we’re honoured to be involved.”
The government has secured 60 million doses of the Novavax vaccine for the UK, which will be manufactured using FUJIFILM Diosynth Biotechnologies’s facilities in Billingham, Stockton-on-Tees. This will ensure that, once approved by regulators, the vaccine can be supplied as quickly as possible.
If any of the vaccines are successful in clinical studies, they could start to be delivered to the UK in 2021. It is expected that these vaccines would first be given to priority groups such as frontline health and social care workers, ethnic minorities, adults with underlying health conditions, and the elderly based on JCVI advice.
In August this year, the UK government and Valneva made a multi-million-pound joint investment in a vaccine manufacturing facility in Livingston, West Lothian, which will be at the heart of efforts to produce a new Covid-19 vaccine. This is in addition to the new Vaccines Manufacturing and Innovation Centre (VMIC), currently under construction in Oxfordshire, and the new vaccine manufacturing plant in Braintree, Essex recently acquired by the Cell and Gene Therapy Catapult.
The UK public can support the national effort to speed up vaccine research and receive more information about volunteering for clinical studies by visiting www.nhs.uk/researchcontact.
