China’s vaccines are ready to fill the gap, but they face confidence issues

With rich countries getting the supply of Covid-19 vaccines, some parts of the world may have to rely on features developed by China to try to conquer the outbreak. The question: will they work?

There’s no outside reason to believe they won’t, but China has a history of vaccine scandals and its drugmakers have revealed little about its latest human trials and more than a million inoculations of use. emergency services they say have been carried out country already.

Rich nations have set aside about 9 billion of the 12 billion shots developed mostly by the West that are expected to occur next year, while COVAX, a global effort to ensure equal access to Covid vaccines. 19, has fallen short of its promised capacity of two billion.

For those countries that have not yet gotten a vaccine, China may be the only solution.

China has six candidates in the final stage of testing and is one of the few countries that can manufacture vaccines on a large scale. Government officials have announced a capacity of 1 billion doses next year, and President Xi Jinping promises that China’s vaccines will be a great help to the world.

The potential use of its vaccine by millions of people in other countries gives China the opportunity both to repair the damage to the reputation of an outbreak that escaped its borders and to prove to the world who may be an important scientific actor.

Still, past scandals have damaged the confidence of their own citizens in their vaccines, with manufacturing and supply chain problems questioning whether he can really be a savior.

“There remains a question mark over how China can ensure the delivery of reliable vaccines,” said Joy Zhang, a professor studying the ethics of emerging sciences at the University of Kent in Britain. He cited China’s “lack of transparency about scientific data and a problematic history with vaccine delivery.”

Bahrain became the second country last week to approve a Chinese Covid-19 vaccine, which joined the UAE. Morocco plans to use Chinese vaccines in a massive vaccination campaign scheduled to begin this month. Chinese vaccines are also pending approval in Turkey, Indonesia and Brazil, while testing continues in more than a dozen countries, including Russia, Egypt and Mexico.

In some countries, Chinese vaccines are viewed with suspicion. Brazilian President Jair Bolsonaro has repeatedly cast doubt on the effectiveness of the Chinese vaccine candidate Sinovac without citing any evidence, and has said Brazilians will not be used as “guinea pigs.”

Many experts praise China’s vaccine capabilities.

“The studies appear to be well done,” said Jamie Triccas, head of immunology and infectious diseases at the University of Sydney School of Medicine, referring to the results of clinical trials published in scientific journals. “I wouldn’t be too worried about that.”

China has been developing its vaccination programs for more than a decade. It has produced large-scale successful vaccines for its own population, including measles and hepatitis vaccines, said Jin Dong-yan, a medical professor at Hong Kong University.

“There are no major outbreaks in China for any of these diseases,” he said. “That means vaccines are safe and effective.”

China has worked with the Gates Foundation and others to improve the quality of manufacturing over the past decade. The World Health Organization has prequalified five non-Covid-19 Chinese vaccines, allowing United Nations agencies to buy them for other countries.

Companies whose products have been pre-qualified include state-owned Sinovac and Sinopharm, both leading Covid-19 vaccine developers.

However, the Wuhan Institute of Organic Products, a subsidiary of Sinopharm behind one of the Covid-19 candidates, was caught in a vaccine scandal in 2018.

Government inspectors found that the company, based in the city where the coronavirus was first detected last year, had produced hundreds of thousands of ineffective doses of a combined diphtheria, tetanus and cough vaccine. injury due to equipment malfunction.

That same year it was reported that Changsheng Biotechnology Co. falsified data on a rabies vaccine.

In 2016, Chinese media revealed that two million doses of various childhood vaccines had been stored and sold incorrectly across the country for years.

Vaccination rates fell after these scandals.

“All my local Chinese friends, they’re white-collar, they’re fine, and none of them will buy medicines made in China. That’s right,” said Ray Yip, former country director of Gates Foundation in China. He said he is one of the few who does not care to buy Chinese pharmaceuticals.

China revised its laws in 2017 and 2019 to tighten vaccine storage management and intensify inspections and sanctions for defective vaccines.

Leading Covid-19 vaccine developers in the country have published some scientific findings in peer-reviewed scientific journals. But international experts questioned how China recruited volunteers and what kind of follow-up there were for possible side effects. Chinese companies and government officials have not released details.

Now, after publishing data on the effectiveness of Western-made vaccines developed by Pfizer and Moderna, experts hope to see Chinese results. Regulators in the UAE, where a Sinopharm vaccine was tested, have said it appeared to be 86% effective according to data from interim clinical trials. On Thursday, the Turkish government announced that Sinovac is 91.25% effective based on provisional data.

Sinopharm did not respond to any requests for comment on vaccine efficacy data. Sinovac and CanSino, another Chinese vaccine company, did not respond to interview requests.

For some people in countries where the pandemic shows no signs of relief, the nation of origin of the vaccine is irrelevant.

“I intend to take it, the first one coming, if it goes well,” said Daniel Alves Santos, a chef at a restaurant in Rio de Janeiro. “And I hope God helps.”