India's plasmid new coronavirus vaccine approved-more vaccines are coming soon

India has approved a new COVID-19 vaccine that uses a circular DNA strand (plasmid) to enable the immune system to fight the SARS-CoV-2 virus

ZyCoV-D can enter the skin without injection.

Peter Richmond, a pediatric immunologist at the University of Western Australia in Perth, said this proves that the DNA vaccine is effective and helps control the flu pandemic

There are nearly 12 DNA vaccines against COVID-19 in clinical trials around the world, and at least as many vaccines are in the early stages of development

Shahid Jameel, a virologist at Ashoka University in Sonipat, India, said, “If DNA vaccines prove to be successful, this is really the future of vaccinology” because they are easy to manufacture

rapid development

David Weiner, director of the Wistar Institute's Vaccine and Immunotherapy Center in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, said the urgency of fighting COVID-19 has accelerated the development of vaccines that use genetic technologies, such as messenger RNA and DNA vaccine

In clinical trials, RNA vaccines showed a strong immune response faster; now, they have been delivered to hundreds of millions of people around the world

ZyCoV-D was developed by Zydus Cadila, an Indian pharmaceutical company headquartered in Ahmedabad

ZyCoV-D contains a circular DNA strand called a plasmid, which encodes the spike protein of SARS-CoV-2, and the promoter sequence of the promoter gene

Weiner said that DNA and mRNA vaccines have been in development since the 1990s

Injection-free vaccine

To solve this problem, ZyCoV-D will be deposited under the skin, rather than deep in the muscle tissue

Although ZyCoV-D is more effective than previous DNA vaccines, it requires at least three doses to achieve the initial effect

Jameel said that although ZyCoV-D appears to be less than 90% or more effective than some mRNA vaccines, these numbers are not comparable

Some researchers criticized the lack of transparency in the approval process, because no late-stage trial results have been published yet
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Zydus Cadila said that the trial is still in progress, and they will soon submit a complete analysis report for publication
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The company said that the first batch of vaccines will be used in India in September, and plans to produce up to 50 million doses of vaccine early next year
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DNA vaccines in clinical trials

Currently, clinical trials of the new coronavirus DNA vaccine are underway around the world
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Source: World Health Organization
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COVID-19 vaccine tracking and overview (WHO, 2021)
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Several other DNA vaccines against COVID-19 are under development, using various antigens and delivery mechanisms (see "DNA vaccines in clinical trials")
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Two of these companies have entered the late-stage trial phase: one is led by AnGes, a Japanese company headquartered in Osaka; and the other is developed with the help of Inovio Pharmaceuticals at the Plymouth Conference in Pennsylvania
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Inovio is injected under the skin, using a device to hit the skin with short electrical pulses, forming pores in the cells through which the vaccine can pass
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There are currently more than 6 COVID-19 DNA vaccines in the early stages of testing, one of which was developed by Seoul-based South Korean biotech company GeneOne Life Science (GeneOne Life Science), and the other was developed by Bangkok-based Thai company BioNet , Richmond participated in the project
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This vaccine is undergoing the first phase of trials in Australia
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But Richmond expects more DNA vaccines to appear, targeting diseases for which there is currently no vaccine, from cytomegalovirus, which can be passed to babies during pregnancy, to respiratory syncytial virus
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DNA vaccines against influenza, human papillomavirus, HIV and Zika virus are also being tested or developed
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DNA vaccines can store a lot of information, which means they can encode large, complex proteins and even multiple proteins
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Weiner said this gives them hope as anti-cancer vaccines, and he is exploring this possibility in his own research
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"This is a very exciting time for genetic technology
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They finally have the opportunity to show their abilities
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