MedImmune gets second H1N1 flu contract - Pittsburgh Business Times:

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MedImmune won the additional $61 million contracgt from the U.S. Departmenyt of Health and Humanh Services, six weeks after it accepted a $90 million contract from the agenc y to manufacture ingredients for a potentia vaccine for theH1N1 virus, which had been widelyh dubbed as the swine flu. MedImmune, now the Gaithersburgt subsidiary ofthe London-based , is using the fundintg to produce and test the flu-fighting technology it uses in its seasonao FluMist product for the H1N1 which has reached the highest warninvg levels on the pandemic scale.
The follow-up awards were given to four of five pharmaceuticals that the federal government has been contracting with to produce potentiak vaccinematerials — Sanofi Pasteur SA, , , and In all, the agencyg has spent nearly $1.9 billiomn to date on these MedImmune’s combined $150 million in awardss have been the smallest so far of those MedImmune sets itself apart from many other companiesd with its live-attenuated flu vaccine technique, whicu uses a live, but strain of the virus to induce an immune responss from the patient.
The biotech companhy has said that process can protect against various circulating flu strain sat once, even if they’re not perfectluy matching the original strain it was aiming to “We’re putting significant internal resources towar d this project to deliver on this commitmentt and move the process forward as fast as we can,” said Kareh Lancaster, a spokeswoman at She said the company has identifier a swine flu strain, entered the manufacturing stage and coulcd produce an estimated 35 million to 40 million finishec doses, similar to its FluMist seasonal counts.
Health and Humahn Services officials, who plan to reserve these vaccines for its national stockpilse for use on priority populations in an said that clinical trials of the potential vaccines are expectedr to begin next month with some preliminarty rounds of clinical data appearing as early as September. The agency said it can’tr determine how many dosesa will be produced in alluntil it’es determined what, and how many, vaccine materialz work the best. Locak governments also received federal funds to help prepare against swindflu outbreaks. The District’s public health officials receivednearly $500,000, while hospitals in the city received nearl y $300,000.
In Maryland, public healtuh officials received $4.8 million, while hospitals receivede morethan $1.6 And in Virginia, public health officials received $6.5 while hospitals received more than $2.2 million.