Zika Virus Outbreak News Update: New Vaccine Race Starts Due To Zika Virus

The Atwater Laboratory of the University of Connecticut had recenty joined the Zika vaccine race.

According to Hartford Courant, the next vaccine against Zika might come from the laboratory of the Brazilian born Paulo Verardi, working at the forefront of Connecticut's efforts to develop a vaccine for the virus. Joining Verardi are a 4-year-old startup in Farmington and a vaccine manufacturer in Meriden.

Verardi, a pathobiologist at the University of Connecticut, has started his quest to find a vaccine candidate for Zika virus last fall. He was reading the news from his home country and found out about a story of two babies suffering from microcephaly while Brazil was undergoing an outbreak of the Zika virus.

Verardi was able to secure a research grant from the university and his team of three undergrads and two graduate students began working toward a vaccine. At the time when they applied for their first grant in November, nobody had heard of the Zika virus. Obviously, this is no longer the case now, when it's all been about Zika in the news.

Meanwhile, Protein Sciences in Meriden recently began working on a Zika virus vaccine candidate that the company claims it can be ready for human clinical trials in six to eight weeks. Earlier this month, a Farmington-based biotechnology company called CargoGen Corp. also started work on a Zika vaccine.

The Zika virus outbreak affected more than a million people in Brazil alone and has now spread to more than 40 countries, according to Forbes. This makes it imperative to urgently develop a vaccine. However, simply having ready a vaccine prototype or candidate doesn't mean much.

According to the World Health Organization, around 15 companies are already working on developing a Zika vaccine, but the regulatory approval process is long and difficult. It is estimated that large-scale trials are not to be expected within the next 18 months.

Among the leading vaccine efforts are Bharat Biotech in India and Inovio Pharmaceutical in Pennsylvania. Bharat was also the first to file a global patent for a Zika virus vaccine candidate.