The World Health Organization has granted approval to Chinese made Sinopharm vaccines for COVID-19 for emergency use.
The move paves the way for Beijing to help in boosting the vaccine supply against COVID-19 in many countries.
Sinopharm became the first vaccine to be approved from China and manufactured in a non-Western country.
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It is also the first time the WHO has given emergency use approval to a Chinese vaccine for any infectious disease.
WHO experts have previously expressed apprehensions over the quality of data from these Chinese vaccines.
A WHO emergency listing is a signal to national regulators that a product is safe and effective.
Following the approval, Sinopharm will also be included in the COVAX facility where rich countries donate money to help buy COVID-19 vaccines to poor countries.
This expands the list of COVID-19 vaccines that COVAX can buy, and gives countries confidence to expedite their own regulatory approval, and to import and administer a vaccine,” WHO Director-General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus said.
The WHO said that it will be up to Sinopharm on how many vaccines can they produce.
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“They are looking at trying to provide substantial support, make substantial doses available while at the same time of course trying to serve China’s population,” it said.
Pfizer-BioNTech, AstraZeneca, Johnson & Johnson and, last week, Moderna also received the WHO approval for emergency use.
The Sinopharm vaccine was registered by the UAE Ministry of Health and Prevention on December 9 following a large-scale local trial.
It has since been approved for use in more than 30 countries, including Hungary, Serbia and several countries across Asia, Africa and South America.
In a report on The National, 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. (TDT)
