Pharmsintez, a company in Rusnano’s portfolio, will become the exclusive distributor of Sci-B-Vac, the third-generation hepatitis B vaccine registered by the Ministry of Health of Russia. This was reported on Wednesday in the press service of the Rusnano management company, TASS reports.
“The drug provides a longer and better protection: 30 months after vaccination with Sci-B-Vac, the study participants had 5.5 times more protective antibodies than people vaccinated with a conventional vaccine. In accordance with our plan, domestic infection disease doctors can start administering Sci-B-Vac later in 2022, with the pilot supply of the drug amounting to 80,000 doses,” the press service quotes Efim Prilezhaev, Pharmsintez General Director, as saying.
Sci-B-Vac is the only hepatitis B vaccine registered in the Russian Federation that produces a more powerful antiviral immunity compared to widely used second-generation vaccines. The registration certificate for Sci-B-Vac in the Russian Federation is held by St. Petersburg pharmaceutical company PAO Pharmsintez. According to preliminary estimates, the demand of the Russian pharmaceutical market for a new vaccine may exceed 300,000 doses per year.
According to Mikhail Mikhailov, a corresponding member of the Russian Academy of Sciences, head of the Laboratory of Viral Hepatitis of the I.I. Mechnikov’s Research Institute of Vaccines and Sera, the vaccine’s safety and effectiveness was proved based on the vaccination of more than 500,000 newborn children and adults. The proteins of the (Pre-S1 and Pre-S2) play an important role in increasing the concentration of antibodies by stimulating the cellular or humoral immune response, which provides increased effectiveness of the vaccine in groups at risk of hepatitis B infection.
