THE CONSORTIUM DEVELOPING A UNIQUE HUMAN RIFT VALLEY FEVER VACCINE
We are a consortium of six partners with a single goal: the development and evaluation of a vaccine for the prevention of Rift Valley fever in humans. The project is named "LARISSA", acronym for Live Attenuated Rift Valley Fever Vaccine for Single Shot Application. ​​​
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Our hRVFV-4s candidate vaccine has been evaluated for safety and immunogenicity in a First in Human (FIH) Phase I study in Belgium in the LARISSA I project. The Phase II development is currently ongoing in our LARISSA II project, which is financed by the Coalition for Epidemic Preparedness Innovations (CEPI), with support from the EU Horizon Europe programme. CEPI aims to accelerate the development of vaccines against emerging infectious diseases and to enable equitable access to these vaccines in the face of outbreaks.
The consortium
Wageningen Bioveterinary Research
Wageningen Bioveterinary Research (WBVR) is a business unit of Wageningen University Research (WUR) in the Netherlands. WBVR contributes to the prevention, eradication and control of animal infectious diseases and zoonoses in the Netherlands through research, diagnostics and consultancy.
BunyaVax
BunyaVax BV is a spin-off from WUR and WBVR and commercializes vaccine technologies developed by WBVR. BunyaVax’s mission is to exploit its vaccine technology platforms to develop efficacious and safe vaccines against infectious diseases and cancer.
CR2O
CR2O BV is a full service CRO for public organizations, biotech and pharma industries. CR2O combines strong scientific leadership and operational excellence to conduct innovative national and global clinical trials. CR2O built extensive experience managing and implementing phase I-IV clinical trials.
BATAVIA biosciences
Batavia Biosciences was founded in 2010 by Chris Yallop and Menzo Havenga with a goal to help clients from an early idea through process development into clinical GMP manufacturing. Batavia is a recognised centre of excellence in biopharmaceutical R&D and clinical manufacturing with a mission to reduce human suffering from infectious disease to cancer.
Research Centre for Emerging Infections and Zoonoses
Research Centre for Emerging Infections and Zoonoses (RIZ) is a ‘One Health’ research centre embedded in the University of Veterinary Medicine Foundation, Hannover (TiHo). RIZ research focuses on the identification and characterization of emerging animal and human viruses, and development of intervention strategies to control their impact.
Centre for Vaccinology
Centre for Vaccinology (CEVAC) consists of the Clinical Trial Unit and the Immunomonitoring Laboratory. These two units are affiliated with Ghent University Hospital (UZGent) and Ghent University (UGent), respectively. Since 1986, CEVAC-CTU has conducted more than 250 clinical vaccine trials and CEVAC-LAB has strong expertise in immunomonitoring.
About CEPI
Coalition for Epidemic Preparedness Innovations
CEPI is an innovative partnership between public, private, philanthropic, and civil organisations launched in Davos in 2017 to develop vaccines to stop future epidemics. CEPI has received multi-year funding from Norway, Germany, Japan, Canada, Australia, and the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, and Wellcome. CEPI has also received single-year investments from the Governments of Belgium and the United Kingdom. The European Union provides financial support for relevant projects through their Horizon 2020 programme as well as through the European and Developing Countries Clinical Trials Partnership. CEPI has reached over US$ 750 million of its $1 billion funding target. Since its launch in January 2017, CEPI has announced three calls for proposals. The first call was for candidate vaccines against Lassa virus, Middle East Respiratory Syndrome coronavirus (MERS-CoV), and Nipah virus. The second call was for the development of platforms that can be used for rapid vaccine development against unknown pathogens. The third call is for candidate vaccines against Chikungunya and Rift Valley fever viruses.
"These trials will help to accelerate the urgent need for a protective vaccine. Besides offering protection in areas where the virus is already active, an RVF vaccine will contribute to preparedness for potential virus emergence in for instance Europe"
Paul Wichgers Schreur
Project Lead and Molecular Virologist at Wageningen Bioveterinary Research