China’s Sinovac says’ready to mass produce’ experimental coronavirus vaccine

Chinese pharmaceutical firm Sinovac Biotech is carrying out human trials for a coronavirus vaccine and said on Thursday it’s ready to start producing its product on a mass scale.

Sinovac, the first company in the world to market a vaccine for the H1N1 swine flu, has claimed great progress in its research and unrevealed it’s now in a position to start producing 100 million vaccines a year.

The Beijing-based firm is behind one of four authorised clinical coronavirus vaccine trials in China.

Even though it’s only two weeks into human trials – and the vaccine has a long way to go before it is approved – AFP reported that thousands of units of the experimental drug – named Coronavac – have already been manufactured.

This is because Sinovac must demonstrate it is able to produce the product on a large scale, and must present batches to the authorities for control.

Promising results from animal trials

Last week the Chinese company reported that its Coronavac – consisting of a chemically inactivated version of the virus – had “largely protected” monkeys from being infected with the new coronavirus, or SARS-CoV-2, which causes Covid-19.

In its human trials which started on 16 April, Sinovac administered the drug to 144 volunteers. The company hopes to determine the vaccine’s safety by the end of June, before moving on to the third trial phase which will include testing human carriers of the virus.

However, there’s still no news on when the new drug might make it to market. “This is the question everyone is asking,” Sinovac director of brand management Liu Peicheng told AFP.

While more than 100 laboratories worldwide are racing the time to come up with a vaccine, reports say only seven have come as far as clinical trials.