The mpox epidemic is the latest health crisis the world is scrambling to control.
The virus, which began as a strain dominating cases in the Democratic Republic of Congo, has now spread to other parts of Africa, with the first European cases confirmed in Sweden and the World Health Organization declaring it a global emergency last week.
Mpox, formerly known as monkeypox, has so far proven deadly to hundreds of infected people, including children, although the majority of cases have been mild.
Bavarian Nordic is the only company that can solve this problem.
As the situation worsened last week, the Danish pharmaceutical giant donated 40,000 doses of its MPOX vaccine, Imvanex, to African public health agencies, and the European Commission and other regional groups have announced they will donate 215,000 doses of their vaccine stockpiles to African health authorities.
The drug was approved when a health emergency regarding MPOX was declared in 2022, and at that time the vaccine made a significant contribution to curbing the epidemic.
More Imvanex (also known as Jynneos) is still needed to protect those most vulnerable to potential MPOX infection. In Congo, where many cases have been recorded, there is still no vaccine at all.
So what do we know about Bavarian Nordic and how does it fit in during the recent global health crisis?
The Danish pharmaceutical giant is back again
Founded in 1994, Bayern Nordic is a Copenhagen-based pharmaceutical company specialising in the development of vaccines for diseases such as chickenpox, typhoid and rabies.
The company is the only company to have its MPOX vaccine approved in the European Union, the United States and other countries.
The company began working with the U.S. government in 2003 to develop a smallpox vaccine (similar to the one used in the measles vaccine).
Bayern Nordic has been instrumental in developing and supplying vaccines during other health crises, such as Ebola: In 2021, for example, the company received a bulk purchase order worth $28 million from Johnson & Johnson's Janssen Pharmaceutical Companies.
National and regional health authorities have been boosting vaccine supplies since the smallpox outbreak two years ago, when the EU bought 2 million doses of a vaccine approved for use in adults because the smallpox and monkeypox viruses are closely related.
The WHO emergency declaration sent shares in Bayern Nordic soaring by more than 40%. The company's shares have risen 51% since the start of the year, giving it a market capitalization of $3.28 billion.
Bayer Nordic is the latest Danish drugmaker to gain momentum. Novo Nordisk has grown rapidly in recent years thanks to the popularity of its weight-loss and diabetes drugs Wegovy and Ozempic, while Zealand Pharma has emerged as a new challenger in the obesity drug market.
The overall influence of the Danish pharmaceutical industry has led to strong economic growth, with GDP now dependent on the performance of pharmaceutical companies.
Bavarian Nordic was founded in 1994.
Courtesy of Bavarian Nordic
What is your current role at Bayern Nordic?
As the mpox crisis continues to unfold, Bavarian Nordic said it is speeding up the pace of vaccine production to improve availability. In a statement released by the company on Saturday, the company told African health authorities it could provide 2 million doses this year and 10 million by the end of 2025.
The company says it can now produce millions of doses of the vaccine to have “supply capacity in case of any potential outbreak.”
And that's not all: The company also submitted new data to the EU seeking approval to expand Imvanex to include people ages 12 to 17, as the recent rise in cases has also affected younger people. The U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) has already granted emergency authorization for the vaccine's use in young people.
“The latest data we have submitted is very important. We hope that the use of our vaccine will expand to younger people,” Bavarian Nordic CEO Paul Chaplin told CNBC last week.
African health officials have requested 10 million doses of the vaccine, which will come from a combination of international donations and supplies from Bavarian Nordic. Other pharmaceutical companies may also pitch in to provide vaccines. For example, US-based Emergent BioSolutions has a smallpox vaccine that is used to treat monkeypox, though the latter use has not yet been approved by the FDA.
Meanwhile, the Danish company also plans to conduct clinical trials in children aged between 2 and 12 to test the safety of the vaccine, as MPOX infects children.
Despite playing a vital role in curbing the spread of MPOX, Chaplin maintains that it is not the “only solution” to the disease.
“The international community needs to work together with Bavarian Nordic to actually find a way to distribute this vaccine and contain the spread,” he said.
Bayern Nordic did not immediately respond to Fortune's request for comment.
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