Seite 3: Measure active ingredient levels

Inhaltsverzeichnis

Freiburg is also home to the world's first plant for the fully automated production of tablets and capsules. A tablet is produced here in just a few seconds. The active ingredient content is measured during production with near-infrared spectroscopes. Raman spectroscopes check the identity and purity of the raw materials used through the container walls, reports Glatz. Computers independently evaluate the complicated spectra and control the system. "It takes only a few hours to manufacture a complete batch. In traditional manufacturing, it takes one to two weeks," he points out, arguing: With this high degree of automation and digitalization, and with the large production volumes, the high per capita labor costs no longer matter so much. This means that innovative medicines can still be produced competitively in Europe. Higher, faster and further should secure local production and thus local wages.

But hasn't this monopoly mantra, that one produces highly efficiently for all, proved particularly insecure since the start of the corona pandemic? Glatz replies that a lot can be done within the company to ensure security of supply. Pfizer does not manufacture a particular active ingredient at just one site, but always at several. In the case of critical raw materials, several suppliers are contracted. And if one blister machine for packing the tablets breaks down, 39 others are still running in Freiburg.

Against this background, contract manufacturing is also booming. It is Sanofi's response to the demand for more pharma in Europe. The Group founded the EuroApi platform in 2021. The concept behind this is that pharmaceutical companies do not necessarily have to manufacture their active ingredients themselves, but can just as easily buy them from a company specializing in contract manufacturing. These companies maintain facilities and specialized personnel, but do not develop and produce their own active ingredients. The EuroApi consortium is now to assert itself as a contract manufacturer for active ingredients "Made in Europe.

Mini factories for medicines

Less than an hour's drive from Pfizer's new high-tech plant, Markus Bergmann believes in a very different future for pharmaceutical production in Europe. It would not be the old generics and not the giant factories, but mini-factories at the bedside. At the push of a button, the individual medicine would come out of the machine like a drink.

The mini-factories will print drugs and vaccine from mRNA, the substance that makes up Biontech's and Moderna's corona vaccines. "We already have the machine, a little smaller than a car, here on the fourth floor in Tübingen," says Markus Bergmann, managing director of the new subsidiary CureVac RNA Printer GmbH. The machine can produce one gram per week, or 80,000 doses of vaccine.

It is fed with DNA. At the push of a button, the DNA is broken down into its components with the help of enzymes. These serve as raw material for generating new mRNA. However, to obtain defined RNA, a second batch of DNA is required. This contains the blueprint for producing the desired mRNA. In the Covid vaccine, the injected mRNA contains the instructions for the body's cells to make the coronavirus spike protein. It is then produced on the surface by some of the body's cells, and the immune system learns to recognize it as foreign. It then also attacks the coronavirus in case of infection.