VACCELERATE

VACCELERATE is a clinical research network for the coordination & conduct of COVID-19 vaccine trials. The network is comprised of academic institutions from all over Europe: The consortium is led by the University of Cologne, Germany, and currently includes 29 national partners in 18 EU-member states & 5 countries associated to the EU Horizon 2020 research programme.

VACCELERATE is funded by the European Commission's activities for future pandemic preparedness, the "HERA Incubator", an instrument that was created in analogy to United States' BARDA.

What do we do?

VACCELERATE offers expertise, services, resources and solutions to speed up existing and upcoming development programmes and market authorisation for new vaccines and vaccination strategies. The network serves as a single entry-point for all stakeholders in COVID-19 vaccine development (pharma, academia, European Commission, EMA, ECDC, national health authorities and others) for phase 2 & 3 trials in Europe. The network will address any research question of interest, such as vaccine efficacy in virus variants, trials in children, pregnant women, immuno-compromised patients, trials on combination of different vaccines etc. The establishment of a European volunteer registry for vaccine trials provides fast & efficient recruitment of trial participants (>100,000 volunteers in 22 countries: Austria, Belgium, Cyprus, France, Germany, Greece, Hungary, Ireland,… and expansion to more countries ongoing).

VACCELERATE conducts capacity mapping of new clinical trial sites & laboratories with standardised methods and protocols, and provides standardised educational measures, training and quality management for harmonised vaccine trials. It already holds information on 488 clinical trial sites in 39 European countries. For details see the VACCELERATE Site Network. Harmonisation of data acquisition across all network sites enables open data exchange for valid data analysis.

Objectives

1. Platform building

• To provide the central platform serving as single entry-point for European stakeholders in vaccine development, by:
• A) Establishing a consortium of vaccine development and clinical research excellence, with decision-making and communication structures identifying needs & delivering answers and solutions to stakeholders; and
• B) Offering an open strategic forum for stakeholders from industry, SME, academia, EC, member states and public health authorities.

2. Capacity mapping

• To build and expand a network of capable clinical trial sites and laboratories prepared to kick-start high quality phase 2 & 3 COVID-19 vaccine clinical trials in EU-member states and associated countries.

3. Capacity building

• To ensure highest-quality data output for phase 2 & 3 vaccine trials by providing educational measures to clinical trial sites and laboratories.

4. Volunteer registry

• To provide access to clinical trial participants by establishing a registry for individuals volunteering to participate in phase 2 & 3 COVID-19 vaccine clinical trials.

5. Laboratory acces

• To provide access to laboratory sites in Europe offering a comprehensive, standardised set of methods essential to phase 2 & 3 vaccine clinical trials.

6. Solutions for vaccine development

• Providing solutions for characteristic vaccine development issues during pandemics. To close gaps in public health knowledge on COVID-19 vaccines, and to improve knowledge transfer by providing access to harmonised data, protocols and assays that will speed up vaccine development and serve as blueprints for future pandemic preparedness.

7. Phase 2 and 3 clinical trials

• To answer public health questions on COVID-19 vaccines that are unlikely to be addressed by vaccine developers, or in specific and as of yet under-represented populations and target groups.