Bahar Ramezanpour, Osterhaus A and Claassen E
This study provides a quantitative multidisciplinary approach to identify and prioritize the main implementation challenges of the MVA platform for novel influenza vaccines using a tailor-made prioritization process. Influential key opinion leaders (KOL’s) in the field of vaccine research, development, and manufacturing were approached to participate in this study. Semi-structured interviews were performed with 32 KOL’s representing the regulatory, industry, and academia fields.
The opinions were analyzed quantitatively, through various ranking methods that were integrated and adapted to fit the purpose of this study, identifying 6 implementation challenges main categories, 21 implementation challenges categories, and 39 implementation challenges underlying causes. The most significant barriers are associated with “production & speed” category whereas the least significant are associated with “regulatory” category.
Perspectives among the KOL’s proved to be divergent with regard to implementation challenges for the MVA platform. Through comparing these perspectives, useful information on current and potential future implementation challenges of novel platforms in general may be expected. Providing an overview and assessment to reveal these challenges may lead to a more substantial situation for all stakeholders involved, given that such an overview allows for the recognition of various implementation challenges from a multidisciplinary perspective, making it possible to identify underlying causes that contribute to the successful implementation of the MVA platform. Remarkably, analysis of implementation challenges resulted in core challenges that resemble similarities between the three perspectives.