Pakistan launches locally produced Chinese COVID-19 vaccine

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Pakistan launches locally produced Chinese COVID-19 vaccine - PakVac
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Pakistan has launched the locally produced Chinese CanSino COVID-19 vaccine at the National Institute of Health (NIH). At full running capacity, the NIH is expected to produce 3 million doses a month. The CanSino vaccine was developed by CanSino Biologics Inc. and the Academy of Military Sciences in China. Earlier, the NIH concluded the phase-three trial of the vaccine. As a result, CanSino signed an agreement with the NIH for technical collaboration to transfer technology of the vaccine, which has been rebranded "PakVac" in Pakistan. "We are basically in this collaboration of technology transfer, operating in three stages. First stage is ready to fill in bulk and the second stage is formulation from the concentrate, so we have started the collaboration from the second stage," said M. Firdous Khan, a senior engineer at NIH. As a newly built facility, the lab has already produced the first batch of 120,000 jabs, which are now ready to be rolled out. "Currently I can say (the production capacity) is around 6,000 vials, that means 60,000 doses per day, that's the capacity now. In the future, with requirement of the capacity increasing, we will find some way to increase the capacity together with our Pakistani partner," said Jiang Xicheng, project leader of the tech transfer unit of CanSino Bio. The Pakistani technical staff and scientists inside the NIH laboratory have been trained by experts from China. Currently, Pakistan is inoculating vaccines to those aged 18 and above. This makes around 100 million out of 220 million people eligible for the vaccine. Experts say the swift local production of the vaccine is a result of the dedicated teamwork and collaboration between CanSino and the NIH. Health professionals believe the COVID-19 pandemic has paved the way for health reform in Pakistan and has offered an opportunity to develop domestic bio-manufacturing capacity to make the country self-sufficient and better prepared for the future.