The IVI Establishment Agreement remains open for accession by any state or intergovernmental organization

SEOUL, REPUBLIC OF KOREA, March 9, 2021 /EINPresswire.com/ -- The International Vaccine Institute (IVI) welcomes the Cabinet of Bangladesh’s decision to ratify the IVI Establishment Agreement on February 22, 2021, completing the full accession process to IVI and becoming its 19th State Party.

Bangladesh is a founding signatory to IVI’s Establishment Agreement, the 1996 UN treaty that established IVI as an independent international organization dedicated to vaccine research and development and strengthening vaccine technology capacity in developing countries. The IVI Agreement remains open for accession by any state or intergovernmental organization.

“IVI welcomes the government of Bangladesh’s decision to formally accede to IVI for full membership as a State Party. IVI’s research and capacity-building collaborations with partners in Bangladesh for the past 20 years are exemplary cases of IVI’s work with member states to advance and make available safe, effective, and affordable vaccines where they’re needed most, additionally helping to achieve the government of Bangladesh's goal of extending universal health coverage for all.” said Dr. Jerome Kim, Director General of IVI.

Beginning in the early 2000s, Bangladesh hosted IVI’s surveillance studies which helped capture significant burdens of cholera, Japanese encephalitis, and shigella in South Asia. In 2011, IVI and icddr,b, a Dhaka-based international health research institute, conducted mass vaccination campaigns to protect over 140,000 Dhaka residents from cholera using the IVI-developed oral cholera vaccine (OCV). From 2015 to 2017, IVI also partnered with icddr,b on an OCV single-dose study in Dhaka, enrolling 225,000 participants in one of the largest clinical studies coordinated by IVI.

To vaccinate even more people against cholera and develop in-country capacity to produce life-saving vaccines, IVI transferred OCV technology to Incepta Vaccine Ltd., a GMP-compliant Bangladeshi vaccine manufacturer. IVI and icddr,b supported Incepta in conducting safety and immunogenicity clinical trials in Dhaka, and in January 2020, Incepta’s Cholvax^® oral cholera vaccine was licensed for national use in Bangladesh.

With Bangladesh’s full membership, IVI looks forward to further collaborations across clinical development, epidemiology, and technology transfer to advance vaccine solutions for urgent global public health challenges.

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About the International Vaccine Institute (IVI)
The International Vaccine Institute (IVI) is a nonprofit inter-governmental organization established in 1997 at the initiative of the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP). IVI has 36 signatory countries and the World Health Organization (WHO) on its treaty, including the Republic of Korea, Sweden, India, and Finland as state funders. Our mandate is to make vaccines available and accessible for the world’s most vulnerable people. We focus on infectious diseases of global health importance such as cholera, typhoid, shigella, salmonella, schistosomiasis, chikungunya, group A strep, Hepatitis A, HPV, TB, HIV, MERS, COVID-19, as well as antimicrobial resistance. For more information, please visit https://www.ivi.int

Aerie Em
International Vaccine Institute
aerie.em@ivi.int
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