MANILA (Reuters) – The Philippines aims to finalize talks with Sinovac Biotech to buy a 25 million dose of the Chinese company’s Govt-19 vaccine by March, a Corona virus task force official said Monday.
President Rodrigo Duterte, who has maintained warm relations with Beijing, wants to vaccinate all 108 million people in his country, preferably buying vaccines from Russia or China.
Philippine officials met with Sinovak representatives on Friday, and there will be another meeting this week to finalize a deal, said Carlito Calves, the country’s vaccinating leader.
“We have already informed them of our needs, 25 million by 2021,” Calves said at a news conference, adding that vaccine distribution is targeted for March.
The country’s pharmaceutical company is evaluating Sinovak’s plan to conduct Phase 3 clinical trials in the Philippines. Tests are underway in Indonesia and Brazil.
Filipino companies signed a contract for 2.6 million shots of the Covit-19 vaccine, developed by AstroGeneca, the first supplier of the Corona virus vaccine in Southeast Asia, in May or June last month.
Durday’s spokeswoman Harry Rock told a news conference for people waiting on Western vaccine brands that “the Chinese brand is coming soon.”
Since taking office in 2016, Durte has set aside a regional location in the South China Sea, with billions of dollars in pledged Chinese aid, loans and investment.
But a July poll found that distrust in China, including its vaccines, is widespread in the Philippines.
The Philippines’ $ 370 billion economy, Asia’s fastest growing before the epidemic, plunged into a recession in the third quarter as broad sanctions aimed at controlling the virus crippled the economy.
With nearly 451,000 COVID-19 infections and more than 8,800 deaths, the Philippines has the second highest number of cases and deaths in Southeast Asia after Indonesia.
(Report by Neil Jerome Morales; Editing by Ed Davis)