By Abujah Racheal
An African pharmaceutical company, Minapharm Group, has secured about 16.5 million dollars from the Coalition for Epidemic Preparedness Innovations (CEPI) to advance a vaccine candidate against Bundibugyo ebolavirus into clinical trials.
According to a statement by CEPI, Minapharm Group and its Berlin-based subsidiary, ProBioGen, made available to the News Agency of Nigeria (NAN) on Thursday, the funding will support the vaccine candidate through preclinical development.
NAN reports that it will also support its advancement into an early-stage human clinical trial.
The phase one clinical trial will assess the safety of the vaccine candidate and its ability to generate an immune response, with the trial expected to take place in Africa.
The vaccine candidate is developed by ProBioGen using its proprietary modified vaccinia Ankara (MVA-CR19) vaccine platform.
The platform is based on a highly attenuated poxvirus vector that is unable to replicate in human cells, but can deliver vaccine antigens to stimulate an immune response.
According to the statement, the candidate is designed to stimulate both B-cell and T-cell immune responses, which can provide comprehensive and longer-lasting immunity against Bundibugyo ebolavirus.
The development comes as the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC) battles its largest Ebola outbreak on record, driven by the Bundibugyo strain.
The Minapharm candidate is the fifth Bundibugyo-specific vaccine candidate to receive CEPI support as part of efforts to accelerate the development of vaccines capable of controlling the outbreak and preparing for future epidemics.
CEPI said its goal was to advance at least two Bundibugyo vaccine candidates to Emergency Use Authorisation and World Health Organisation(WHO), prequalification.
Dr Richard Hatchett, CEPI Chief Executive Officer, said the partnership demonstrated the growing capacity for African-led vaccine innovation.
”CEPI funding to Minapharm harnesses the growing strength of African-led innovation to help confront this increasingly severe outbreak and prepare for future threats,” Hatchett said.
He also said that the rapid spread of Bundibugyo virus in the DRC had made it important to advance multiple vaccine candidates using different technologies.
He added that Minapharm’s candidate would broaden CEPI’s vaccine portfolio while advancing a platform that could potentially support future African-manufactured filovirus vaccines.
Dr Wafik Bardissi, Group Chairman and Chief Executive Officer of Minapharm and Chairman of ProBioGen, said the company had more than 25 years of experience in biologics development and manufacturing.
Bardissi said the programme would combine Minapharm’s manufacturing capabilities in Egypt with ProBioGen’s scientific and technological expertise in Germany.
”This programme demonstrates the strength of our capabilities across the full biologics continuum, from design and development through to manufacturing, in response to an urgent public-health threat,” he said.
He also said that the company aimed to strengthen Africa’s ability to develop and manufacture vaccines for diseases affecting the continent.
Dr Jean Kaseya, Director-General of the Africa Centres for Disease Control and Prevention (Africa CDC), welcomed the initiative, describing it as an important step toward strengthening Africa’s capacity to respond to outbreaks.
Kaseya said an African company advancing a vaccine candidate was important not only for the current outbreak, but also for future health emergencies.
The statement said that under the programme, ProBioGen will generate the recombinant MVA drug substance under Good Manufacturing Practice (GMP) guidelines at its facility in Germany.
It said the drug substance, which contains the active component of the vaccine, would then be shipped to Minapharm’s facility in Cairo, Egypt, where it would be formulated into the finished vaccine for testing.
Minapharm also plans to transfer drug substance manufacturing to its biotechnology facilities in Cairo.
If completed, the transfer will enable the company to manufacture both the active vaccine component and finished vaccine product locally.
The move can strengthen regional vaccine manufacturing capacity and reduce reliance on overseas production for future outbreaks.
CEPI said that if the Phase one trial produced positive results, it expected to work with Minapharm and ProBioGen to support later-stage clinical trials.
Those trials would generate efficacy data needed to support emergency use authorisation and eventual licensure.
The organisations said they were committed to working towards rapid and affordable supply of the vaccine to affected countries and populations if it was shown to be safe and effective.
CEPI said its Bundibugyo vaccine development programme had also supported candidates using mRNA, ChAdOx and recombinant vesicular stomatitis virus (rVSV) technologies.
The different approaches were intended to increase the likelihood that at least some candidates will prove safe and effective against the virus.
The coalition also activated its global network of laboratories, manufacturers and clinical trial partners as part of the wider response to the outbreak.
It is supporting clinical research into potential treatments and working with regulators to streamline vaccine approval pathways.
CEPI is also collaborating with affected countries, Africa CDC, WHO, Gavi, UNICEF, the World Bank and other partners to prepare for vaccine procurement, allocation and deployment if effective vaccines become available.
For Africa, the Minapharm programme represents not only an attempt to develop a vaccine against the current Bundibugyo outbreak but also an opportunity to strengthen local capacity for vaccine research, development and manufacturing.
NAN reports that Bundibugyo virus is one of the species of Ebola virus that causes Ebola disease. Unlike the Zaire ebolavirus, for which licensed vaccines exist, there is currently no licensed vaccine or specific treatment for Bundibugyo virus.
The current outbreak was first detected in the DRC in May 2026, after cases of a high-mortality illness were reported in Mongbwalu Health Zone in Ituri Province.
Laboratory tests subsequently confirmed Bundibugyo virus disease, prompting the DRC to declare its 17th Ebola outbreak on May 15.
The outbreak also spread across the border into Uganda, leading the WHO to declare the epidemic a public health emergency of international concern on May 17.
Since then, transmission has expanded rapidly across the DRC.
By Aug. 12, WHO reported 4,665 confirmed cases and 2,184 deaths in the DRC, with the outbreak having spread to 54 health zones across six provinces.
WHO described it as the largest Ebola outbreak ever recorded in the country and said it was expanding faster than previous Ebola outbreaks.
The outbreak has been complicated by insecurity, population movement, difficulties with contact tracing and challenges in accessing affected communities.
The absence of a licensed Bundibugyo-specific vaccine or treatment has also increased the urgency of developing and evaluating new medical countermeasures.
Edited by Deborah Coker