Germany’s CureVac to launch human trial of experimental coronavirus vaccine

German biotech firm CureVac is set to begin human trials of a potential coronavirus vaccine, Germany’s vaccines regulator announced on Wednesday.

The Paul-Ehrlich-Institut, Germany’s Federal Institute for Vaccines and Biomedicines, has authorised the clinical trial of the potential vaccine developed by CureVac following “a careful assessment of the risk/benefit profile of the vaccine candidate.”

On Monday, German Economy Minister Peter Altmaier confirmed that the government would acquire a 23 percent stake for €300 million ($337.4 million) in CureVac.

CureVac’s vaccine candidate is an RNA vaccine which contains the genetic information for the construction of the so-called spike protein of the SARS-CoV-2 pathogen in the form of ribonucleic acid (RNA).