In his interview for “Sogodni’ news outlet, the deputy health minister Viktor Lyashko told about the prospects of Ukraine’s making own Covid-19 vaccine.

According to the top health official, the first vaccine can be made in Lviv.

Lviv Institute of Cell Biology research team of Andriy Sybirnyi is now working toward production of ‘coronavirus protein that is grown in yeast cells’, said the health official explaining that ‘the same technology is applied for production of vaccines for hepatitis B’.

This vaccine is scheduled for preclinical trials in September.

Palladin Institute of Biochemistry is developing their own vaccine. The research team is led by Serhiy Komisarenko. The results showed some promise and are also due this autumn.

‘They are using the similar principle for vaccine development, but the technology is different [..] They are ready to carry out work on their own mRNA vaccine and now are looking for options to produce protein substance using the domestic production facilities,’ said Lyahko.

Both of these vaccine programs secured the state funding from Ukraine’s National Fund of Research.

The third vaccine is developed by Mykhaylo Favorov and ‘Diaprof-Med’ company that claimed ‘to neutralize the virus in cells’.

‘They are in the phase of medical formulations,  [coming] before clinical trials’, said the health officials.

Stressing that making  a Ukraine-produced Covid vaccine can prove a time-consuming undertaking , the deputy health minister expressed his cautious optimism that ‘Ukrainian pharmaceutical companies are presently ready to provide for technologies’ transfer to produce vaccine against coronavirus illness’.

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