Sinopharm and Sinovac are producing about 12 million doses a day, just a little over the 10 million doses that China hopes to administer daily to meet the domestic target. The companies would have to produce roughly 500 million additional doses to meet the demands of other countries, according to a calculation of data provided by Bridge Consulting, a Beijing-based consultancy focused on China’s impact on global health.
The vaccine shortage in China underscores the complexity of rolling out a mass vaccination campaign for the world’s most populous nation while also trying to execute an ambitious export program. Companies involved in the vaccine supply chain, such as those making syringes, are working overtime.
“The whole world is short of this vaccine,” said a Sinovac spokesman, Pearson Liu. “The demand is just too great.”
To mitigate the shortfall, Chinese officials said those getting vaccinated in China could delay getting their second shot by as long as eight weeks, or they could combine the same type of vaccine from different companies. They have said the shortage should ease by June.
Andrea Taylor, who analyzes global data on vaccines at the Duke Global Health Institute, called the potential addition of two Chinese vaccines into the Covax program a “game changer.”
“The situation right now is just so desperate for low and lower middle income countries that any doses we can get out are worth mobilizing,” Ms. Taylor said. “Having potentially two options coming from China could really change the landscape of what’s possible over the next few months.”
China’s vaccines have been rolled out to more than 80 countries, but they have faced significant skepticism, in part because the companies have not released Phase 3 clinical trial data for scientists to independently assess the vaccines’ efficacy rates. An advisory group to the W.H.O. published the data this week.
Article source: https://www.nytimes.com/2021/05/07/business/economy/china-sinopharm-vaccine-who.html
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