Vaccine Plant Based

About Vaccine Plant Based

Plant based vaccine production uses plants as bioreactors to produce vaccine antigens. Medicago, a Canadian company, developed a plant based COVID vaccine using Nicotiana benthamiana, a relative of tobacco. The vaccine used virus like particles VLPs produced in plants. Health Canada authorized the Medicago COVID vaccine, Covifenz, in February 2022, the first plant based COVID vaccine approved. However, the WHO rejected the vaccine for emergency use listing because of Medicago ties to Philip Morris, which held a minority stake. The rejection limited the vaccines market. Medicago was shut down by its Mitsubishi parent company in 2023. Other plant based vaccine efforts include iBio and Kentucky Bioprocessing. Plant based production offers advantages including lower cost, scalability, and no need for mammalian cell culture. The technology may find applications in stockpile vaccines and veterinary vaccines.