Countries at back of vaccine queue face China choice
With rich countries snapping up supplies of Covid-19 vaccines, some parts of the world may have to rely on Chinese-developed shots. But will they work?
China has a history of vaccine scandals, and its drugmakers have revealed little about their final human trials and the more than 1 million emergency-use inoculations they say have been carried out there already.
China has six Covid-19 vaccine candidates in the last stage of trials, and is one of the few nations that can manufacture vaccines on a large scale. Government officials have announced a capacity of 1 billion doses next year.
The potential use of its vaccine by millions of people in other countries gives China an opportunity both to repair the damage to its reputation from an outbreak that escaped its borders, and to show the world that it can be a major scientific player.
Yet past scandals have damaged its own citizens’ trust in its vaccines, with manufacturing and supply chain problems.
‘‘ A question mark remains over how China can ensure the delivery of reliable vaccines,’’ said Joy Zhang, a professor at the University of Kent in England who studies the ethics of emerging science. She cited China’s ‘‘non-transparency over scientific data, and a troubled history with vaccine delivery’’.
Bahrain last week became the second country to approve a Chinese Covid-19 vaccine, joining the United Arab Emirates. Morocco plans to use Chinese vaccines in a mass immunisation campaign slated to start this month. Chinese vaccines are also awaiting approval in Turkey, Indonesia and Brazil, while testing continues in more than a dozen countries, including Russia, Egypt and Mexico.
Many experts praise China’s vaccine capabilities. ‘‘The studies look to be well done,’’ said Jamie Triccas, head of immunology and infectious diseases at the University of Sydney’s medical school, referring to clinical trial results published in scientific journals.
China has been building up its immunisation programmes for more than a decade, and has produced successful vaccines on a large scale, including for measles and hepatitis. It has worked to improve manufacturing quality.
But the Wuhan Institute of
Biological Products, which is behind one of the Covid-19 candidates, was caught up in a scandal over ineffective vaccines in 2018. The same year, it was revealed that Changsheng Biotechnology Co had falsified data about a rabies vaccine. In 2016, Chinese media reported that 2 million doses of various vaccines for children had been improperly stored and sold for years. Vaccination rates fell after those scandals.
China revised its laws in 2017 and 2019 to tighten management of vaccine storage and to step up inspections and penalties for faulty vaccines.
The country’s major Covid-19 vaccine developers have published some of their findings in peerreviewed scientific journals. But international experts question how China recruited volunteers, and what kind of tracking there was for possible side effects. Chinese companies and government officials haven’t released details.