A joint research team of Padjadjaran University (Unpad) and state-owned pharmaceutical company PT Bio Farma personnel is researching two COVID-19 candidate vaccines. The research is expected to be complete in the next three years.

Bio Farma’s project integration manager for research and development, Neni Nuraini, said the candidate vaccines were being developed in anticipation of another pandemic situation in the future.

The research aims to develop two candidate vaccines. The first one is a wheat-based recombinant protein vaccine, while the second one, which is funded by the Indonesia Science Fund (DIPI), is a peptide-based recombinant vaccine. The wheat-based vaccine is targeted to be completed by 2022, while the peptide-based vaccine is set to finish in 2023.

“Hopefully they’ll already become candidate vaccine prototypes by then,” said Neni, tempo.co reported on Tuesday, adding that the new research was separate from the Chinese-developed Sinovac vaccine.

“This vaccine development research is an alternative to various platforms of the Red and White vaccine, which is under preparation,” she added.

Researching a vaccine alternative, Neni went on to say, would allow more chances for a successful vaccine development compared with depending on only one candidate vaccine.

In a previous report, Unpad’s COVID-19 diagnostic research team coordinator Muhammad Yusuf said they were currently researching three candidate vaccines.

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The two, in partnership with Bio Farma, are the peptide liposome-based and recombinant candidate vaccines. Meanwhile, the third candidate, in partnership with a private company, is a passive vaccine created out of chicken antibodies.

“Out of the three candidate vaccines, the passive vaccine possesses the biggest chance for a pre-clinical trial while the other two are still being developed,” Yusuf said on Tuesday.

A group of scientists from the United Kingdom’s New and Emerging Respiratory Virus Threats Advisory Group (NERVTAG) discovered a new variant of coronavirus that has been spreading rapidly in Britain on Dec. 21.

The new variant reportedly carries mutations that make children more susceptible to coronavirus infection compared with the previous strains.

The Sinovac vaccine research team manager from Unpad, Eddy Fadlyana, said there were not many reports of coronavirus mutation discoveries in Indonesia.

“As of now, there are only a few discoveries of coronavirus mutations worldwide. We predict that the vaccine will still be effective in two or three years,” Eddy said on Tuesday.

He added that the COVID-19 vaccine, which is currently being developed, was created to combat the existing coronavirus strain before it mutated.

“We will observe if the mutation affects low antibody levels, for example, if the cases are still high after the vaccine has been administered to people. If so, we will develop another vaccine to adjust to the situation,” he explained. (dpk)

Editor’s note: This article is part of a public campaign by the COVID-19 task force to raise people’s awareness about the pandemic.