WHO decision improves children’s access to safer polio vaccine

The novel type 2 oral polio vaccine (nOPV2), developed by a team including scientists from the UK’s Medicines and Healthcare products Regulatory Agency (MHRA), has now been quality-assured (prequalified) by the World Health Organization (WHO).

Three years after it received its Emergency Use Listing (EUL) and with 950 million doses now delivered worldwide, nOPV2 has been  prequalified by the WHO, following analysis of outcomes in vaccinated populations, confirming the strong safety profile and effectvenss of the vaccine, the MHRA stated, noting that the nOPV2 vaccine helps to protect children from polio while lowering the risk of vaccine-derived outbreaks.

Development of the vaccine began in 2011 through a consortium of experts led by the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, including the UK National Institute for Biological Standards and Controls (NIBSC), the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (US-CDC), the US Food and Drug Administration, PA TH and the University of California at San Francisco.