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SERRANA, Brazil (Reuters) - The COVID-19 vaccine developed by China’s Sinovac Biotech is effective against the UK and South African variants, the vaccine’s Brazilian partner said on Wednesday, citing test results in Chinese trials.

We have tested this vaccine in China against the English and the South African variants, with good results,” said Dimas Covas, head of the Butantan biomedical center in Sao Paulo which lead domestic trials of the Chinese vaccine and is supplying doses to Brazil’s Health Ministry.

Covas did not give any more details on exactly how effective the vaccine proved against these strains.

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Butantan is also testing the vaccine, known as CoronaVac, against the Brazilian variant of the virus which appeared in the city of Manaus, he said.

“Soon we will have the results and we are very positive it will do the job,” Covas said.

Covas was speaking at a news conference in the small city of Serrana, in the interior of Sao Paulo state, where Butantan began on Wednesday a mass vaccination campaign aimed at inoculating the entire adult population against COVID-19 to test whether it lowers the infection rate.

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Covas said he expects CoronaVac to have an advantage over other vaccines due to the technology it uses - an inactivated version of a coronavirus strain.

The efficacy of the Chinese vaccine against the Brazilian strain in particular will be vital to Brazil. The government has secured 100 million doses and made the vaccine a centerpiece of its inoculation campaign.

Covas’ comments come as several cities in Brazil, including state capitals of Rio, Salvador and Cuiaba have suspended new vaccinations as they ran out of doses.

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2021-02-18 17:07 | Report Abuse

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COVID-19 | The National Pharmaceutical Regulatory Agency (NPRA) has received applications to register three more Covid-19 vaccines for use in the country, said the Health director-general.

Dr Noor Hisham Abdullah said that the vaccines may also be given conditional registration, which would allow for their quick registration.

"So far three more companies have sent their dossier to the NPRA. These are for the Sinovac, Sputnik V, and Astrazeneca vaccines.

"The NPRA is still conducting tests to see the effectiveness of the vaccines, and if they have side effects. The focus is especially on the vaccines' third phase of clinical trials.

"We have given some feedback so that they can reply and present (to us) for approval. There is a possibility that conditional registration can be given to these vaccines too," he told reporters at a press conference in Putrajaya today.

So far, only one Covid-19 vaccine - developed by Pfizer and BioNTech - has received such conditional approval from the NPRA for use in the country.

Noor Hisham added that conditional registration would allow pharmaceutical companies to submit the latest data they have on a vaccine from time-to-time for evaluation.

He gave the example of a research on Covid-19 vaccines that can be given to individuals aged 12 and above.

"We will see if there is evidence of effectiveness on 12-year-olds and above, and if there are side effects.

"Until we get strong evidence, then only we would recommend vaccine use on the group," he said. - Mkini