Sinovac deal swells COVAX jabs pipeline

The COVAX vaccine equity scheme is on course to begin deliveries in the developing world of a COVID-19 vaccine from Sinovac Biotech from next month, after the United Nations this week announced a deal reached with the Chinese pharmaceutical company for 200 million doses.

The UN Children's Fund, or UNICEF, said on Monday that Sinovac will supply 50 million doses through September, and 150 million doses over the rest of this year. Both parties agreed to an option for a further 180 million doses in the first half of 2022, taking the total number of doses available under the deal to 380 million.

The vaccines will be distributed through COVAX, which is an international partnership of organizations that oversees the equitable distribution of vaccines around the globe, especially in developing regions. The Sinovac vaccine, called CoronaVac, is widely used in many nations, but only became eligible for distribution under COVAX when it gained approval for emergency use from the World Health Organization, or WHO, in June.

"Deliveries could start as early as August providing countries are ready to receive them," UNICEF said in a statement. Science analytics company Airfinity expressed confidence that Sinovac would be able to meet its supply target for COVAX.

"Sinovac has delivered the most doses to date of all the candidates at 1.17 billion doses and with its expanding production capabilities we would expect Sinovac to be able to successfully deliver these doses to COVAX by the end of 2021," Airfinity's lead analyst Caroline Casey told China Daily.

UNICEF now has eight supply deals in place for COVAX with the Serum Institute of India (which manufactures the AstraZeneca jab),Pfizer, AstraZeneca, Human Vaccine (which makes the Sputnik V jab),Moderna and Janssen. Sinovac's fellow Chinese drugmaker Sinopharm is also among the eight.

The new supply deal follows on from an advance purchase agreement made between Sinovac and COVAX partner the Global Alliance for Vaccines and Immunization, or Gavi, in mid-July.

Gavi has an advance purchase agreement in place with Sinopharm for 60 million doses, with an option for a further 110 million through the first half of 2022.

Gavi said that the inclusion of the Sinopharm and Sinovac vaccines in the COVAX portfolio will help the program contend with supply delays, which have greatly hampered distribution.

In the first half of this year, COVAX was heavily reliant on doses of the AstraZeneca jab manufactured in India and South Korea, as well as a smaller supply from Pfizer. After Indian authorities paused vaccine exports due to major domestic outbreaks of the coronavirus, the COVAX program missed distribution targets by a wide margin, delivering just 77 million of an intended 252 million doses by early June.

Critical moment

The timely supplies come as the world health body raises a new warning over increasing deaths.

The global number of new infections is on the increase, with 3.8 million new cases confirmed in the week ending July 25, and a sharp jump has been reported in the number of deaths, the WHO said on Wednesday.

For the past week, the global number of new cases rose by 8 percent compared with the previous week, with substantial increases in the Americas and the Western Pacific, the WHO said in a weekly update report.

At over 69,000, the number of COVID-19 deaths reported during the latest reported week increased by 21 percent week-on-week. Most of the new deaths were in the Americas and Southeast Asia, said the report.

The impact of COVID-19 in Africa has been relatively less severe in recent days, as the Delta variant has not yet been detected in many countries there, it said.

Xinhua contributed to this story.