HCMC – Deputy Minister of Health Truong Quoc Cuong has signed a decision approving China’s Vero Cell Covid-19 vaccine for emergency use, making it the third Covid-19 vaccine to get emergency use authorization in Vietnam.
The Vero Cell vaccine is produced by China National Pharmaceutical Group Co., Ltd. (Sinopharm), for intramuscular injection, with each 0.5-ml dose containing 6.5U of inactivated Covid-19 antigen, the local media reported.
The approval was based on data on safety, quality and efficacy provided by the National Institute of Hygiene and Epidemiology.
Under the decision, the institute was told to stay on high alert on the use of the vaccine in terms of safety and quality and be responsible for cooperating with the vaccine manufacturer to ensure the production and import of the vaccine.
Besides, the institute must work with the Administration of Science, Technology and Training and other units to evaluate the vaccine’s safety and efficacy.
The Chinese vaccine has been authorized for emergency use by the World Health Organization and approved for emergency use by 41 countries and territories, according to the Ministry of Health.
Earlier, Vietnam had approved Britain’s AstraZeneca vaccine and Russia’s Sputnik V vaccine for emergency use.
As of June 3, over 1.156 million doses of AstraZeneca’s Covid-19 vaccine had been administered to Vietnamese people, with 31,551 of them receiving two shots.
