BEIJING (Pakistan Point News / Sputnik - 20th March, 2021) China has authorized the emergency use of its first recombinant subunit protein vaccine against COVID-19, which is administered as a three-dose series separated by 28 days, the health committee of the eastern Anhui province said.
The vaccine, developed by Anhui Zhifei Longcom Biopharmaceutical and the Institute of Microbiology of the Chinese academy of Sciences, embarked on clinical trials in June. By October, it finished phase 1 and phase 2 trials. Phase 3 trials started in China's Hunan Province in November and in Uzbekistan's Tashkent in December. In March, Uzbekistan approved the vaccine.
"The results of the trials show that no serious adverse effects were detected after vaccination, and the level of produced neutralizing antibodies is comparable to other recombinant protein and mRNA vaccines used in the world," the committee said.
The Anhui authorities stressed that production of this vaccine does not require high biosafety-level facilities. The vaccine production is not associated with a biosafety risk and can be scaled up very quickly. Costs are significantly reduced, and the vaccine is easy to store and transport.
Anhui Zhifei Longcom Biopharmaceutical has already built a production line with a capacity of 300 million vaccine doses a year, which is enough to vaccinate 100 million people.
With the emergency use approval of the recombinant protein vaccine, China added a fifth COVID-19 shot to its arsenal.
