A volunteer takes his COVID-19 vaccine injection on March 19 in Wuhan. Photo: Courtesy of Zhu Aobing

A Tianjin-based Chinese vaccine company on Wednesday announced its collaboration with Canadian National Research Council on clinical trials of a novel coronavirus vaccine.  

CanSino Biologics Inc, a China-based company of vaccine products for human use, announced that it and the National Research Council of Canada had initiated the collaboration to advance clinical trials for the Recombinant Novel Coronavirus Vaccine (Ad5-nCoV). The clinical trial will start from phase 1/2, aiming for accelerated phase 3 clinical trials to demonstrate the efficacy of the vaccine, according to the company's announcement posted on the Hong Kong Exchanges and Clearing Limited. 

China and Canada have been actively engaging in collaboration regarding the COVID-19 pandemic response. The Chinese government's donation of 32 tons of medical aid materials has recently arrived in Canada, and China has been continuing to provide assistance and convenience for the Canadian side in facilitating the country's purchase of medical materials in China, said Zhao Lijian, Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesperson, at a routine press conference on Wednesday.  

China is willing to work together with countries around the world including Canada to accelerate research and development of medicines and vaccine for COVID-19 treatment, and make contributions to safeguarding global health security and fighting the pandemic, Zhao noted.

The Ad5-nCoV vaccine has been approved to enter into phase 1 clinical trial in China this March, and results from preclinical animal studies of the vaccine show that the vaccine candidate can induce a strong immune response in animal models. The preclinical animal safety studies demonstrated a good safety profile, according to the company. The company plans to carry out phase 3 clinical trials in more countries.

The vaccine is subject to approval by Health Canada, for which CanSino Biologics is in the process of filing a clinical trial application, according to the National Research Council of Canada. 

It is one of only a handful of vaccine candidates in the world against COVID-19 so far approved for initial safety testing in humans, and was the first candidate vaccine to begin conducting phase 2 human clinical trials, the National Research Council of Canada said.

So far, three domestically developed vaccines have entered clinical trials in China. 

Global Times