16 Chinese COVID-19 vaccines undergoing clinical trials: Official

China is conducting clinical trials of 16 COVID-19 vaccines, seven of which have entered phase-III trials and one has conditionally hit the market, said Wu Yuanbin, an official with the Ministry of Science and Technology, informed state-run CGTN TV.

Wu made the comments during a haematology conference on Saturday.

Yang Sheng, Deputy Director of China’s National Medical Products Administration’s drug registration bureau, said last month that a total of 11 Chinese vaccine candidates are in different stages of testing at home and abroad.

Currently, China is vaccinating people at home and some countries abroad with two vaccines. The Chinese government has given conditional approval to Sinopharm while the results of the phase-3 trial are yet to be released.

The World Health Organisation (WHO) is reviewing the trials of both the vaccines.

China has said that so far 46 countries have expressed their desire to import the China-made vaccines.

Respiratory-disease expert Zhong Nanshan said on Sunday that the mass inoculation of homegrown COVID-19 vaccines underway in China shows the vaccines are safe and effective.

The two vaccines currently in use in China – the China National Biotec Group (CNBG) COVID-19 vaccine and the CoronaVac vaccine developed by China’s Sinovac Biotech – are both inactivated vaccines that are relatively safe, Zhong said at the launch ceremony of an event in south China’s Guangdong province.

According to the Chinese Centre for Disease Control and Prevention (China CDC), more than 24 million doses of the COVID-19 vaccine had been administered in China till Sunday, state-run Xinhua news agency reported.

“The rate of the vaccines” mild adverse reactions, which include fever, sore arms and other symptoms, is six per 100,000 people,” Zhong said.

The rate of severe adverse vaccine reactions is one in a million, only one-third of that of flu vaccines, he said.

(Edits by EP News Bureau)