AstraZeneca signed a deal June 9 with two federal agencies and Nashville, Tenn.-based Vanderbilt University to develop COVID-19 antibodies that could potentially prevent and treat the disease, according to Bloomberg Law.
The pharma giant signed a contract with the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency and the Biomedical Advanced Research and Development Authority to launch an early clinical trial testing the antibodies' effectiveness. It also sanctioned two immune proteins from Vanderbilt.
If trials are successful, the antibodies could become an alternative to a COVID-19 vaccine in certain cases.