OSAKA: Japanese pharmaceutical startup AnGes Inc. said Tuesday that it has started a clinical trial of a potential vaccine for COVID-19.

The clinical trial, the first in Japan for the coronavirus disease, will be participated in by 30 healthy adults at Osaka City University Hospital.

The participants will take the vaccine candidate twice with a two-week interval. Results will be compared between those with higher doses and those with lower doses.

If its safety is confirmed, the vaccine will be tested on around 500 more people, with the aim of gaining approval from authorities as soon as possible.

What is tested in the trial is a so-called DNA vaccine developed by AnGes. Immunity is expected to be acquired through the intake of a part of DNA replicated from the novel coronavirus.

Making the DNA vaccine does not require the cultivation of the virus itself and is therefore expected to take a shorter time to produce than other vaccine types.

AnGes aims to produce the vaccine for 200,000 people by next March.

JIJI Press