China Admits Its Covid Vaccine Efficacy 'Not High'; Country Considers Mixing Vaccines To Boost Effectiveness

Gao Fu, the director of the Chinese Centers for Disease Control and Prevention said that changing the number of doses and the length of time between doses was a solution to the efficacy issues. 

Representational Image

New Delhi: On Saturday, Gao Fu, the director of the Chinese Centers for Disease Control and Prevention formally said that the country is considering mixing Covid vaccine to increase its efficacy after recent data showed that Chinese vaccine efficacy was "not high". 

“Inoculation using vaccines of different technical lines is being considered,” Gao told a conference in the Chinese city of Chengdu according to a Reuters report.

Gao said that changing the number of doses and the length of time between doses was a solution to the efficacy issues. 

According to the Reuters report, vaccine developed by China’s Sinovac Biotech when given at a time period shorter than three week was 49.1% effective based on data from a Phase III trial in Brazil this is below the 50% threshold set by World Health Organization. The results was published by Brazilian researchers in a paper on Sunday ahead of peer review.

But data from a small subgroup showed that the efficacy rate increased to 62.3% when the doses were given at intervals of three weeks and longer. The overall efficacy rate for the vaccine was slightly above 50% in the trial. Although data from a small sub-group the efficacy rate increased to 62.3% when the doses were given at intervals of three weeks and longer. The overall vaccine efficacy is slightly higher than 50%. 

Whereas in the vaccine created by Sinopharm no detailed efficacy data has been released. It has said two vaccines developed by its units are 79.4% and 72.5% effective respectively, based on interim results according to Reuters. 

After the CDC director admitted about the low efficacy of Chinese vaccine, Gao Fu, head of the China CDC, in an exclusive interview to Global Times said as scientists around the world are discussing vaccine efficacy, he offered a scientific vision: that to improve the efficacy, adjustment of vaccination procedures and sequential inoculation of different types of vaccines might be options.  

"The protection rates of all vaccines in the world are sometimes high, and sometimes low. How to improve their efficacy is a question that needs to be considered by scientists around the world," Gao said. "In this regard, I suggest that we can consider adjusting the vaccination process, such as the number of doses and intervals and adopting sequential vaccination with different types of vaccines", said Gao Fu.

So far, China has developed and approved four domestic vaccines for public use and a fifth for smaller-scale emergency use.  The Reuters reported said that an official said the country will most likely produce 3 billion doses by the end of the year.

Millions of vaccines have been shipped abroad by China, officials and state media have fiercely defended the shots while calling into question the safety and logistics capabilities of other vaccines.

"How to improve the protection rate of vaccines is a problem that requires global scientists to consider,” Gao said, adding that mixing vaccines and adjusting immunisation methods are solutions that he had proposed according to the report.