Biotech Manufacturers Explore Global Access and Supply Chain Hurdles
Industry is joining with academia and global health leaders to examine new approaches to biotech manufacturing that can help expand access to important therapeutics around the world. A Global Health Initiative involving collaboration between CASSS, the separations society, and the Massachusetts Institute of Technology Center for Biomedical Innovation (MIT–CBI) will explore new technologies and production approaches with potential to ensure a reliable and sustainable supply of affordable vaccines and therapeutics to treat diseases prevalent in developing countries.
At a workshop sponsored by MIT–CBI and CASSS during the WCBP Symposium in Washington, D.C. in January 2016, participants examined factors limiting third-world access to biotech products and innovations likely to overcome these roadblocks. Steve Hadley of the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation discussed how projected demand for treatments in all regions are overwhelming current manufacturing capacity, illustrating the need for more productive cell cultures able to produce high volumes of low-cost drug substances. Gates is investing in the development of high yield cell lines, innovative fill-finish technologies, and mRNA vaccines, and in projects to establish platforms for low-cost monoclonal antibodies (mAbs) and alternative host production.
Source: Pharmtech
