Sanofi Pasteur taking no orders of pandemic flu vaccine

Sanofi Pasteur MSD has said it does not intend to sign any new contracts to supply H5N1 flu vaccine ahead of any eventual pandemic.

While the vaccine specialist group had signed contracts with two countries to supply pandemic vaccine, any further contracts would be agreed at the time of a pandemic and individual countries would be supplied based on a formula.

The clarification of the company's stance came after it appeared to miss out entirely on a UK contract worth around Euro 230m awarded to GlaxoSmithKline and Baxter on 16 August.

Sanofi Pasteur MSD was one of two other companies that had also tendered for the contract.

Although the company had contracted to supply France and the US with pandemic vaccine, these were exceptions and had been agreed some time ago.

"We committed to a certain number of doses for countries where our flu vaccine production is located. We have signed what needed to be signed for France and the US," a spokesman said.

The 'complex' formula also included an allocation for third-world countries that were not historically customers of the group. The spokesman said the exact amount to be awarded to such countries was dependent on many factors, including levels of production, but at the moment was estimated to be around 5% of capacity.

While the company's existing seasonal flu capacity was 170 million doses based on a trivalent 45 microgram formula, its monovalent pandemic product required much less antigen. Furthermore, clinical trials, for which results were expected before the end of the year, included a vaccine with "very low antigen with this novel adjuvant."