MINSK, 26 April (BelTA) – Pre-clinical animal trials of the Belarusian vaccine will begin in the near future, Anatoly Krasko, head of the biosecurity laboratory of the Belarusian National Research Center for Epidemiology and Microbiology, told reporters, BelTA has learned.
"Very soon we will approach the stage of immunization of animals. It will take at least a month," said Anatoly Krasko. According to him, the prototype of the vaccine is expected by the autumn, and clinical trials are to begin next year.
According to Elena Gasich, head of the laboratory for diagnosing HIV and related infections, the task is to separate strains. A strain dominating the country will be selected as a candidate for the development of the vaccine. At the moment, experts have already selected several strains and moved on to the next stage.
"In order to understand the specific features of reproduction of the virus, its immunological potency, we constantly monitor all the variants imported into our country. Positive samples of patients who came from abroad are being screened,” Elena Gasich said. “Thanks to this screening we found a new British variant, which was imported into the country. Today we are monitoring other options. We have developed our own system to carry out these studies in a fairly economical mode."
The domestic vaccine will be effective against different variants of the coronavirus, the head of the laboratory noted. "Our task is to find those variants of the virus that will bind to antibodies. It is possible that the composition will change, because the virus is evolving much faster than expected," she said.
According to Anatoly Krasko, now work is underway on making a prototype version of the vaccine and on developing the technology to produce it.
Today, six laboratories of the National Research Center are involved in the development of the Belarusian vaccine.
