Sanofi Pasteur’s dengue vaccine demonstrates efficacy

Sanofi Pasteur has announced that its tetravalent dengue vaccine candidate has demonstrated efficacy in a groundbreaking study conducted in Thailand.

In the world's first ever dengue efficacy trial, Sanofi Pasteur's drug was shown to be able to protect against three of the four dengue virus serotypes circulating in the country, as well as offering an excellent safety profile.

Dengue fever is a mosquito-borne disease that is estimated to threaten nearly three billion people worldwide, making treatment of the disease an important public health priority.

Large-scale phase III dengue vaccine clinical studies with 31,000 participants are underway in ten Asian and Latin American countries.

Dr Michel De Wilde, executive vice-president for research and development at Sanofi Pasteur, said: "We are fully committed to making dengue a vaccine-preventable disease by bringing a safe and effective vaccine to people living in endemic regions of the world."

Last month, the company was granted a positive opinion from the European Medicines Agency on Hexaxim, an innovative new six-in-one vaccine treatment for paediatric patients.