China’s Sinovac Biotech has secured approximately USD500 million in funding for Covid-19 vaccine development from Sino Biopharmaceutical.
In a statement, the company said it expects to be able to manufacture 300 million vaccine doses annually, and aims to complete construction of a second production facility by the end of 2020 to increase annual vaccine production capacity to 600 million doses.
In another note, according to President Joko Widodo, Indonesia received its first shipment of 1.2 million doses from China’s Sinovac Biotech, on Sunday (Dec 6), a vaccine Indonesia has been testing since August, as the government prepares a mass inoculation programme.
The President also said that the government plans to receive another 1.8 million doses in early January.
The vaccine still needs to be evaluated by the country’s food and drug agency (BPOM) while his administration continues to prepare for distributing the vaccine across the vast archipelago of 270 million people.
Indonesia’s daily number of coronavirus infections have accelerated in recent weeks, with total confirmed cases reaching 575,796 on Sunday with 17,740 deaths, the highest in Southeast Asia.
Late-stage trials of the Sinovac vaccine are also under way in Brazil and Turkey, with interim results on efficiency from Brazil expected by mid-December.