Study leaders congratulate PrEPVacc teams on opening all trial sites

PrEPVacc’s Lead Applicant and Coordinator, Professor Jonathan Weber and its Chief Investigator, Professor Pontiano Kaleebu, have written to all colleagues working on the PrEPVacc study to congratulate them on achieving the milestone of opening all trial sites for enrolment of participants.

Acknowledging the dedication and hard work over the past three and a half years of the site teams and those from MRC/UVRI & LSHTM, CTU@UCL, IAVI, EuroVacc and Imperial to get the trial up and running, they said that “in the circumstances in which we have all been working, this is really a great achievement.”

“We both recognise that PrEPVacc is a very large, complex trial with multiple GMP materials, with all the regulatory hurdles and challenges which go with such innovative products. We have faced wholly unexpected setbacks with the COVID-19 pandemic which have made the study set-ups even more challenging than in more normal circumstances.”

- Professor Jonathan Weber and Professor Pontiano Kaleebu

Looking back to the origins of PrEPVacc they hailed the “twenty long years of scientific and clinical development of these vaccine candidates in Europe and Africa, which has underpinned our efficacy trial”, before reminding colleagues that PrEPVacc’s success will now depend on its speed of recruitment.