$487M US vaccines contract for Novartis

The US Department of Health and Human Services has announced a $487.0-million, multiple-year contract with Novartis Vaccines and  Diagnostics, a US unit of the Swiss drug major, to build the first  American facility to manufacture cell-based vaccine for seasonal and  pandemic flu. Because the cell-based product can be made faster and in  greater quantities than traditional vaccine, the new facility is  expected to increase the USA's capacity to make pandemic flu vaccine by  at least 25%.

Cell-based vaccine production could more easily meet surge capacity  needs because cells could be frozen and stored in advance of an epidemic  or developed rapidly in response to an epidemic. This also dramatically  reduces the possibility for contamination and promises to be more  reliable, flexible, and expandable than egg-based methods. Currently,  influenza vaccines licensed by the Food and Drug Administration are made  in specialized chicken eggs using a process that has changed little in  over the last 50 years.