Tania RabesandratanaOn 25 January, as France’s third pandemic wave gathered force, Christophe d’Enfert, scientific director of the Pasteur Institute, appeared on national TV with a grim duty: explaining how the venerable institute, named after vaccine pioneer Louis Pasteur, had given up on its most advanced COVID-19 vaccine candidate.
Around the same time, French drug giant Sanofi said its own contenders were delayed—and that it would cut hundreds of French jobs.