CUBA'S VACCINE

Soberana is Cuba’s, the first candidate vaccine against COVID-19

Soberana is Cuba’s, the first candidate vaccine against COVID-19 in Latin America and the Caribbean
A vaccine that exemplifies the development of Cuban science; that places us on the level of economically advanced countries; that honors Comandante en Jefe Fidel Castro Ruz, the principal architect of the country’s biotechnology sector. This is what Soberana is, the first Cuban candidate vaccine against COVID-19 authorized for testing in clinical trials.

Yudy Castro Moralesaugust 27, 2020 09:08:37

Photo: Twitter
A vaccine that exemplifies the development of Cuban science; that places us on the level of economically advanced countries; that honors Comandante en Jefe Fidel Castro Ruz, the principal architect of the country’s biotechnology sector. This is what Soberana is, the first Cuban candidate vaccine against COVID-19 authorized for testing in clinical trials.

To discuss the process of its development, entering the first phase of clinical trials the end of August, the results of which should be available early next year, and the accomplishment achieved by the joint work of a large group of Cuban scientists, leaders of the Finlay Vaccine Institute (IFV), project researchers, and the assistant director of the State Center for Quality Control of Medications (Cecmed), appeared on Cuban television’s Mesa Redonda program.

This is vaccine candidate number 30 – the first in Latin America and the Caribbean – to receive authorization for clinical trials, among the more than 200 under development around the world, noted Vicente Vérez Bencomo, director of the Finlay Vaccine Institute. He emphasized that, given the lack of knowledge of the previously unknown virus, it was impossible to predict how quickly a COVID-19 vaccine could be developed, since projects of this kind generally take years.

Nevertheless, he said, over an unprecedented short period of time, much information on SARS-COV-2 has been generated around the world, and, again exceptionally, access to these scientific studies has been made available free of charge.

He recalled that, in the beginning, the first option to develop a vaccine was basically to cultivate the virus, inactivate it, and put the material to use, the well-known procedure used to develop vaccines of this nature. How this would work was not known precisely, but by this past January, the world was moving forward with the first efforts using traditional methods.

Subsequently, Vérez continued, after the virus’ genome mapping was completed in March, a group of vaccine projects based on this genetic information began to advance more rapidly, although reservations about them emerged. Continue reading Soberana is Cuba’s, the first candidate vaccine against COVID-19 →

Cuba moves closer to a COVID-19 vaccine

Cuba moves closer to our own COVID-19 vaccine

Cuba moves closer to our own COVID-19 vaccine
Authorization granted to the Finlay Vaccine Institute to begin clinical trials of new vaccine in collaboration with Ministry of Public Health institutions

National news staffaugust 20, 2020 12:08:36

This past July 28, Cuba’s candidate vaccine was tested for the first time on human volunteers, precisely three researchers participating in its development. An initial evaluation revealed a strong immune response in all three.

Photo: BioCubaFarma
The central state enterprise management group BioCubaFarma reports having received permission to begin clinical trials of a Cuban candidate vaccine to prevent COVID-19, capable of producing a strong immune reaction to a SARS-COV-2 infection.

Identified as FINLAY-FR-1, the vaccine project led by the Finlay Vaccine Institute, the Center for Molecular Immunology – both affiliated with BioCubaFarma – with the collaboration of the University of Havana’s Chemical and Biomolecular Synthesis Laboratory, has satisfactorily concluded the drug’s development stage and pre-clinical studies in animals, producing the scientific findings required to support authorization, by Cuba’s Center for State Control of Medications, Medical Equipment and Devices (Cecmed), to conduct clinical trials.

The announcement explained that this license allows for joint work with different institutions affiliated with the Ministry of Public Health to begin at this time, initiating “the clinical trial phase I-II, known as Sovereign, which will be followed by other clinical studies, before the vaccine is considered ready for use.”

BioCubaFarma also reported that an industrial production strategy is being developed to build capacity with the goal of “having available the millions of doses needed to protect our population,” once the studies are concluded.

Also of special interest is the fact reported that Cuba’s candidate vaccine is the 30th – the first in Latin America and the Caribbean – to receive authorization for clinical trials, among the more than 200 under development around the world.

The Finlay Vaccine Institute, which submitted the license application, has more than 30 years of experience in developing vaccines, the announcement notes, stating, “The fact that the Institute has available platforms developed for other epidemics, specifically that developed for the meningitis epidemic in the 1980s, allowed these important results to be obtained.”

BioCubaFarma, the leading enterprise group in Cuba’s biotechnology and pharmaceutical industry, described the progress made in the urgent effort to develop a vaccine here as a tribute to Comandante en Jefe Fidel Castro Ruz, visionary founder and promoter of the sector, while taking healthy pride in the results achieved, called on the entire population to maintain rigorous implementation of preventative measures to contain the epidemic, as the country draws closer to producing our own vaccine.

“These have been weeks of intense work and self-sacrifice, very tense days, during which we have counted on the intelligence and commitment of our scientific community that has as its priority protecting health and saving lives, and assures the people that there will be no rest until every Cuban is protected from this terrible disease with a vaccine, but that, at this time, it is important to continue adhering to the hygienic-sanitary precautions established by the Ministry of Public Health to confront COVID-19.”

The first Cuban Communist party

Events on August 16-17, 1925, forever marked Cuba’s destiny

Our Party has never failed to play a leading role in every struggle, every accomplishment
Events on August 16-17, 1925, forever marked Cuba’s destiny. On these dates, a group of courageous men founded our first Communist party, the indispensable link between patriotic thinking of the 19th century, fundamentally that of Martí, and the ideals of social emancipation of later eras.

Author: Ángel Freddy Pérez Cabrera | freddy@granma.cu
august 20, 2020 10:08:15

Photo: Dunia Álvarez
Events on August 16-17, 1925, forever marked Cuba’s destiny. On these dates, a group of courageous men founded our first Communist party, the indispensable link between patriotic thinking of the 19th century, fundamentally that of Martí, and the ideals of social emancipation of later eras. They understood the value of continuity.

Two exceptional Cubans played a key role in the Party’s founding, Carlos Baliño and Julio Antonio Mella.

The first was a member of a patriotic generation that took to the scrub to wage an armed struggle against Spanish colonialism, and an unconditional friend of José Martí, with whom he founded the Cuban Revolutionary Party, the new organization’s valuable predecessor; while the young Mella, at only 22 years of age, represented the best of the generation that would give continuity to the struggles of Céspedes, Agramonte, Gómez, Maceo and Martí.

The principal mission of these visionary individuals, upon establishing the Party and joining the Third International founded by Vladimir I. Lenin in 1919, was to set about developing a program of demands for workers and campesinos; work actively in trade unions; and defend the rights of women and youth.

This was a difficult era and, on a daily basis, Cuban revolutionaries faced the iron fist of dictator Gerardo Machado, who organized brutal repression of the newly founded organization. The Party’s elected first secretary, José Miguel Pérez, was forced into exile, while other members, like Mella, faced trumped-up charges for crimes they did not commit.

But the nascent organization continued its work valiantly, with the leadership of individuals of the stature of Rubén Martínez Villena and others.

With the world stage dominated by the historic struggle against fascism and the creation of popular anti-imperialist fronts, the Party, known at that time as the Revolutionary Communist Union and later the Popular Socialist Party, defended the people’s rights in the bourgeois parliament.

No less important was its work during the struggle against the Batista dictatorship, under very dangerous conditions, with most efforts carried out underground.

After the triumph of the Revolution, January 1, 1959, under the leadership of Fidel and Blas Roca, a process began to unify the Party and the two political organizations that had carried the most weight in the revolutionary struggle against Batista – the July 26th Movement and the Revolutionary Directorate.

Thus, in 1961, the three groups merged to form the Integrated Revolutionary Organizations (ORI), as the antecedent to the constitution in 1963 of the United Party of the Socialist Revolution of Cuba (PURSC), which on October 3, 1965, adopted the name it has maintained to date, the Communist Party of Cuba.

Since then, our Party has never failed to play a leading role in every struggle, every accomplishment, as the vanguard of Cuban society during the most important moments the nation has faced.

If the Party has earned one merit in its history, it is to have preserved the nation’s unity, which has allowed us to confront persecution, genocidal blockades, wars, and threats of all kinds – and emerge victorious.

For this and other reasons, Fidel described the Party as the soul of the Cuban Revolution, as the organization that synthesizes the dreams and aspirations of a people over more than 100 years of struggle.

Today, as the homeland faces new challenges as a result of the pandemic that is ravaging the world and affecting us, as well, aggravating the impact of the vicious U.S. blockade, the Communist Party of Cuba stands firm and guarantees the historic continuity of the Revolution.