GeoVax Labs collaborating on vaccine candidates for Marburg virus, Sudan ebolavirus

GeoVax Labs is working on a collaboration to develop vaccine candidates for both the Sudan ebolavirus and Marburg virus.

The collaboration is between GeoVax, the University of Texas Medical Branch (UTMB), and Battelle Memorial Institute. The partners will utilize the suite of preclinical services from the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases (NIAID), which is part of the National Institutes of Health (NIH).

The Sudan ebolavirus causes Ebola virus disease in humans, with a fatality rate as high as 71 percent. Marburg virus is a hemorrhagic fever virus with up to a 90 percent fatality rate. Both are rated by the World Health Organization as a Risk Group 4 Pathogens. The most recent outbreaks of Marburg occurred in 2017 in Uganda, Africa, where more than 25 percent of people infected died. The last Sudan Ebolavirus outbreak also took place in Uganda in 2012, killing 57 percent of people infected.

The vaccine candidates will be tested for immunogenicity and efficacy in the benchmark nonhuman primate model. There will be two vaccine regimens – single-dose and prime/boost immunization — for each vaccine tested.

“This exciting collaboration enables us to advance these two critically needed vaccine candidates through nonhuman primate testing,” David Dodd, GeoVax president and CEO, said. “Previously, our novel vaccine against Ebola virus achieved 100 percent single-dose protection in a nonhuman primate lethal challenge model, and we have consistently validated our vaccine platform capability against other infectious pathogens, resulting in vaccine candidates that have demonstrated 100 percent preclinical protection in a single dose, without the need for adjuvants. Through our HIV vaccine clinical program, our platform has a demonstrated track record of safety and vaccine durability in humans. Such attributes are critically important when developing vaccines against emergent epidemic threats such as SUDV and MARV, which cause death in up to 90 percent of cases.”

GeoVax Labs is a clinical-stage biotechnology company that develops human vaccines against infectious diseases and cancer using a novel proprietary vaccine platform. On this platform, MVA, a large virus capable of carrying several vaccine antigens, expresses proteins that assemble into VLP immunogens within the person receiving the vaccine.