‘First shipment of single-dose Chinese vaccine to reach Pakistan on Thursday’

KARACHI: The first shipment of 70,000 doses of single-dose Chinese vaccine Convidecia, developed by the CanSino Biologics Inc, will reach Islamabad on Thursday, March 25, 2021, officials said on Monday, saying the shipment comprises 60,000 doses ordered by the Government of Pakistan while the remaining 10,000 doses were being imported by a private firm AJM Pharma Ltd.

“The first shipment of Convidecia (Ad5-nCoV) developed by CanSino Biologics Inc comprising 60,000 doses ordered by the Government of Pakistan as well 10,000 doses being imported privately by the AJM Pharma are expected to reach Islamabad on Thursday, 25th March," Hasan Abbas Zaheer, technical advisor of the AJM Pharma (pvt) Limited, told The News on Monday.

The Drug Regulatory Authority of Pakistan (DRAP) has recommended a Maximum Retail Price (MRP) of Rs4,225 for the single dose of Chinese Convidecia vaccine in Pakistan although the federal cabinet has to approve and notify the price, the AJM official said adding that the vaccine would initially be available at three major hospitals in Islamabad, Lahore and Karachi where its trials were conducted.

The registration board of Pakistan’s Drug Regulatory Authority of Pakistan (DRAP) had given emergency use authorization to CanSino Biologics’s single-dose vaccine in the second week of February 2021 after the Chinese manufacturer released interim efficacy results from a multi-country trial, which included Pakistan, showing 65.7pc efficacy in preventing symptomatic COVID-19 cases and a 90.98pc success rate in stopping severe infections.

“We would be providing the single-dose vaccine to Shifa International Hospital in Islamabad, Shaukat Khanum Hospital Lahore and the Aga Khan University Hospital, Karachi, for inoculating the people. These are the three of five institutions where the phase three clinical trials of the vaccine were held in Pakistan," Hasan Abbas Zaheer said. The other two institutions where clinical trials were held included Indus Hospital Karachi and University of Health Sciences (UHS) Lahore, he added.

The AJM Pharma official maintained that after the first shipment of 10,000 doses of the vaccine, they would import another 100,000 doses in April while in May 200,000 doses would be imported from China, which would be provided to government-authorized large hospitals and health institutions in the country.

He further maintained that they were also planning to import the vaccine in bulk quantity from China and then it would be filled in single-dose vials here, which would reduce its cost and the vaccine would become more affordable to the people of Pakistan.

“This is also happening for the first time in Pakistan that vaccine vials would be filled locally. It would pave the way for further such collaborations in future and result in lowering the cost of different vaccines”, he added.

An official of the National Health Services said the Chinese single-dose vaccine could be used to inoculate elderly people with movement problems and added that being a one-dose vaccine, it could be used to inoculate elderly and disabled people at their homes.

“Elderly with movement difficulty may be vaccinated at home. But it would be provided free of charge as the government has planned to inoculate people without getting any single penny from them," the official added.