Brazil embraces Chinese Covid vaccine after row

RIO DE JANEIRO: Brazil’s health minister said Tuesday the country would add the Chinesemade CoronaVac vaccine against Covid-19 to its national immunisation programme, despite a political and diplomatic row over whether to use it.

Health Minister Eduardo Pazuello said the federal government had reached a deal with Sao Paulo state, which is helping test and produce the vaccine, to buy 46 million doses to be administered starting in January.

“This vaccine will be Brazil’s vaccine,” in addition to another developed by Oxford University and pharmaceutical firm AstraZeneca, Pazuello told a video meeting of the South American country’s 27 governors.

“That’s our big news. This is going to recalibrate the process” of eventually vaccinating Brazil’s population against Covid-19, which has claimed more lives here than any country except the US.

CoronaVac, developed by Chinese pharmaceutical firm Sinovac Biotech, has been caught up in a messy battle in Brazil.

Far-right President Jair Bolsonaro had labelled it the vaccine from “that other country,” and resisted using it, pushing for the Oxford vaccine instead.

Brazil had previously signed a contract for 100 million doses of the Oxford vaccine.