Vical’s H1N1 flu vaccine shows promise, shares rise

(Reuters) – Vical Inc (VICL) said its vaccine against the H1N1 strain of influenza virus showed positive immune response in preclinical study, sending its shares up 29 percent.

“They needed to get little bit of safety and efficacy signal in animals first. It’s a prerequisite to move forward with this program and it appears they have had some encouraging results so far,” Needham & Co analyst Alan Carr said by phone.

The vaccine candidate produced robust immune responses well above the accepted protection threshold in all the vaccinated mice and rabbits after a standard two-dose vaccine regimen, Vical said.

Furthermore, at least 75 percent of vaccinated animals achieved or exceeded the protection threshold after a single dose of vaccine, the company said.

“The next step is to see if they (Vical) can get some funding from the government,” said Needham’s Carr, who rates the company’s stock a “buy”.

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Vical said it was ready to advance directly to large-scale manufacturing of the vaccine for human clinical trials, subject to securing external funding for this program.

Shares of the company were up 63 cents at $2.83 in pre-market trade. They closed at $2.20 Monday on Nasdaq.

For the alerts double-click [ID:nWNAB3171] . (Reporting by Anand Basu in Bangalore; Editing by Aradhana Aravindan)

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“Our DNA vaccine technology offers an innovative approach to dealing with pandemics,” said Vijay B. Samant, President and Chief Executive Officer of Vical. “The speed of our platform both in development and manufacturing was demonstrated by our rapid completion of vaccine production and successful immunogenicity testing in animals while conventional vaccine manufacturers are still working toward production of their initial supply of H1 vaccine. We are encouraged by these compelling data with our Vaxfectin(r)-formulated DNA vaccine and we look forward to advancing to human clinical trials as soon as possible.”

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