As a part of emergency response to COVID- 19 pandemic there were 54 candidate vaccine in a draft landscape of The World Health Organization on March 26 and British American Tobacco (BAT), the maker of Benson and Hedges, has announced their entrance into this race of developing COVID- 19 vaccine this Wednesday.

According to a press release on Wednesday (April 01, 2020) British American Tobacco (BAT) claims that its' US bio-tech subsidiary Kentucky BioProcessing (KBP) is developing a potential coronavirus vaccine using BAT's proprietary, fast-growing tobacco plant technology and can manufacture up to three million doses a week starting in June with the right partner and support from government agencies. BAT state that the intention of this project is not for profit business.

The company inserted a cloned portion of COVID- 19's genetic sequence into tobacco plants and allows it to reproduce in order to develop a potential antigen which is now undergoing pre-clinical testing after being purified. The company further claimed that the vaccine formulation they are developing will remain stable at room temperature and it has the potential to deliver effective immune response after a single dose.

According to Prof Julian Ma, Hotung Chair of Molecular Immunology, and Director, Institute for Infection and Immunity, St. George's Hospital Medical School, University of London, "Nicotiana benthamiana offers an extremely exciting opportunity to tackle global diseases as the manufacturing system is really fast, hugely scalable and potentially cheaper than the conventional manufacturing systems used for vaccine production. In particularly it is a technology that might make vaccines more affordable and accessible for people in low and middle income countries."

Dr. David O'Reilly, Director of Scientific Research, BAT said in a statement, "Vaccine development is challenging and complex work, but we believe we have made a significant break-through with our tobacco plant technology platform and stand ready to work with Governments and all stakeholders to help win the war against COVID-19. We fully align with the United Nations plea, for a whole-of-society approach to combat global problems."

BAT's acquired KBP in 2014, the same year this biotech group made headline for developing a vaccine against Ebola, with the aim of developing new category non-combustible products using some of its unique extraction technology. Since than KBP is exploring alternative uses of tobacco plants and one of such alternative is developing plant-based vaccines. BAT is now exploring partnership with government agencies and seeking guidance to bring its vaccine to clinical studies as soon as possible. Through proper collaboration with government and third-party manufacturer, BAT believes 1-3 million doses of vaccine can be produced per week against the novel coronavirus pandemic which was started in China's Wuhan in late December last year and killed around half million people till now.

Md. Zahidul Islam Shourav, Mobile: 01521326064, E-mail: zahidul.shourav@gmail.com