CLEARWATER, Fla. (WordNews.org) June 4, 2020 – A pro-life group says pharmaceutical giant Sanofi Pasteur has discontinued the production of their Poliovax vaccine that is produced using aborted fetal cell lines, MRC-5.

Children of God for Life, a nonprofit pro-life outreach organization, said Sanofi also switched the manufacturing of their Pentacel and Quadracel polio combination vaccines from using MRC-5 to what it called “the moral Vero (monkey) cells” and will continue production of their separate polio vaccine, IPOL which also uses Vero cells.

This means that for the first time in decades, Sanofi Pasteur will no longer have an aborted fetal version of polio vaccine, said Children of God for Life, which calls itself “the pro-life world leader in the campaign for ethical vaccines, medicines and consumer products, said

In 2008 the Advisory Committee for Immunization Practices (ACIP) had recommended Sanofi’s Pentacel vaccine as part of the schedule for children. An immediate protest was launched by Children of God for Life, advising physicians and the public to use other moral options on the market instead.

“There was simply no reason for that vaccine to become part of the US recommended schedule,” said Debi Vinnedge, the organization’s founder. “There was already a moral version made by GSK so it made zero sense that the CDC would want to recommend a vaccine that a large number of concerned pro-life physicians and their patients would refuse to use.”

The MRC-5 aborted fetal cell line was produced in 1966 from the lung tissue of a 14-week gestation male baby, aborted in the UK due to “psychiatric reasons” and has been used in several vaccines such as chickenpox, hepatitis-A, some rubella, rabies, shingles and smallpox.

This is the second time in the past six weeks that Sanofi Pasteur has given pro-life consumers cause for celebration. Earlier, Vinnedge announced that GSK and Sanofi had teamed together to produce a new COVID-19 vaccine which will use Sanofi’s insect-based platform as the culture medium.

Noting this unique opportunity to “right a wrong” while the COVID-19 vaccines are still in development, Bishop Joseph Strickland of the Diocese of Tyler, Texas, issued a statement encouraging the public to follow his lead and speak out against the use of aborted fetal cells in vaccines.

Dr. Stacy Trasancos, executive director of the St. Philip Institute, also based in Tyler, urged others to stand beside Bishop Strickland.

“I don’t want to find myself a year from now being required to accept an immorally produced vaccine knowing that I did not speak up when I had the chance,” Trasancos said.

“In troubling times like we are facing today with the COVID-19 shutdowns, we need to use this moment to let the industry know our preferences,” stated Vinnedge. “We are very grateful that Sanofi Pasteur has chosen the moral route and they will indeed be rewarded for those efforts when competing companies using aborted fetal cells will lose this market, guaranteed!”

Sanofi took a turn in the right direction in 2017 by purchasing Protein Sciences whose flu vaccines are produced using caterpillar cells. Vinnedge is encouraging the public to write Sanofi Pasteur to thank them for dropping their aborted fetal polio vaccines and for their COVID-19 in development.

A list of the COVID-19 vaccines in development that use aborted fetal cells and the morally produced options is on Children of God for Life’s website and is being updated as more information becomes available.

Meanwhile, Vinnedge and the Diocese of Tyler are asking the public to take a moment and thank Sanofi Pasteur for their efforts in providing morally produced polio and COVID-19 vaccines.

“Sanofi deserves to know our appreciation for listening to public concerns,” she added, providing the following address to send letters: