Sinopharm vaccine approved by WHO

Our Correspondent

China’s Sinopharm vaccine has been approved for emergency use by the UN health agency, World Health Organisation, which recommended the vaccine for adults 18 years and older. The vaccine can be administered in a two-dose schedule with a spacing of three to four weeks.

The Sinopharm vaccine is produced by Beijing Bio-Institute of Biological Products Co Ltd, a subsidiary of China National Biotec Group (CNBG).

The UAE Ministry of Health and Prevention (MOPHAP) registered it on December 9 following a large-scale local trial.

It was approved for use in more than 30 countries, including Hungary, Serbia and several countries across Asia, Africa and South America thereafter.

Sinopharm became the sixth vaccine to receive “WHO validation for safety, efficacy and quality”, according to WHO’s director-general Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus.

“This expands the list of vaccines that Covax can buy and gives countries confidence to expedite their own regulatory approval and to import and administer a vaccine,” he told a news conference.

WHO’s Strategic Advisory Group of Experts on Immunisation (SAGE) reviewed the vaccine and found its efficacy for symptomatic and hospitalised disease to be 79 per cent.

Sinopharm can now be added to the Covax programme, which provides equitable access to vaccines against Covid-19, helping needy countries procure them.

Its storage is easy making it highly suitable for low-resource settings. It is the also first vaccine that will have a vaccine vial monitor, a small sticker on the vaccine vials that changes colour if the vaccine is exposed to heat, helping health workers know whether the vaccine is safe for use.

A study conducted in Abu Dhabi, where the vaccine has accounted for the bulk of Covid-19 shots administered since the start of the mass vaccination campaign, found it was 100 per cent effective against death.It was also 93 per cent effective in preventing hospitalisation and 95 per cent effective against admission to intensive care.

The WHO had earlier given emergency approval to Covid-19 vaccines developed by Pfizer-BioNTech, AstraZeneca, Johnson & Johnson, and Moderna.

The UAE pharmaceutical company Julphar produces the vaccine locally from its plant in Ras Al Khaimah under the brand name Hayat-Vax.