After adults, Chinese drugmaker Sinovac to begin with CoronaVac vaccine trial on teenagers

Chinese pharmaceutical company Sinovac Biotech plans to broaden the testing of its Coronavirus vaccine trials with teenagers later this month. China's Sinovac vaccine is currently in its Phase III trials with adults. According to a registration published earlier this week, a total of 552 healthy participants aged between 3 and 17 years will take two doses of Sinovac's CoroaVac vaccine on September 28 in the Norther Chinese Provine of Hebei. 

Sinovac's CoronaVac to begin its trials on teenagers 

The Chinese drugmaker is all set to begin its CoronaVac vaccine trials on children and adolescents after getting approval for the same. The reports of Sinovac's vaccine trials so far reveal that the vaccine is safe and it was successful in generating antibodies in older people. China's Sinovac injected its 3,000 employees and their family members with the vaccine to meet the company's target of obtaining a production license by the end of 2020. The company informed that apart from this, the doses of Coronavirus vaccine was injected to protect the employees from the rebound of the epidemic in winters. 

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China recorded its first COVID-19 case last December 2019, in a wholesale market in Wuhan. Despite the fact that the spread of Coronavirus has been controlled in the country, strict preventive measures along with international travel bans by the government still remain in place. Sinovac is one of the three Chinese companies which are currently in its Phase III trials for Coronavirus vaccine under the government-approved fast-track program. Besides China, vaccine trials are also taking place in Indonesia and Brazil. 

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The company said that it is capable of producing 300 million doses of its CoronaVac vaccine and hopes to go into mass production by the end of the year. Last month, it signed an agreement with Indonesia's PT Bio Farma to supply 40 million doses of Coronavirus vaccine before March 2021. Sinovac's president Yin Weidong on Sunday said that Sinovac will only consider densely populated countries with huge outbreaks having very few research development capabilities as its export markets. 

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COVID-19 vaccines across the globe 

China in July approved the emergency use of the Coronavirus vaccines for the military and front line health care workers. State-owned pharmaceutical company Sinophram Group offered free injections of its COVID-19 vaccine while ramping up production of 300 million doses annually. Sinophram hopes to commercialize its COVID-19 vaccine by the end of 2020 and will price them under 1,000 ($147) yuan for two doses. 

Last month Russia became the first country to approve a Coronavirus vaccine with a personal endorsement by President Vladimir Putin who gave the vaccine dose to his daughter while the vaccine had not undergone Phase III clinical trials. Witnessing the race to get get the Coronvirus approved across the globe the World Health Organization said that despite the fact that vaccine is important in the battle against the pandemic, it would not help to extinguish COVID-19 completely. Finding such a vaccine which can completely extinguish Corovirus will not be easy. 

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