A Total Of 1,589 Volunteers Were Injected With The Sinovac Vaccine, The Result?

Illustration / DOK.VOI

JAKARTA - PT Bio Farma said a total of 1,589 volunteers were injected with the COVID-19 vaccine candidate from Sinovac, China, in the phase 3 vaccine clinical trial.

"Currently the recruitment has been completed and nearly 1,589 people have been injected with this vaccine and it is hoped that we will get an 'interim analysis' at the end of January 2021," said representative of the Research and Development Division of PT Bio Farma Neni Nurainy as quoted by Antara , Thursday, October 15th.

In addition to a temporary analysis, the authority for emergency use was also submitted to the Food and Drug Supervisory Agency (BPOM). "Only then will we carry out routine production by Bio Farma for this Sinovac vaccine in 2021," he said.

The target number of volunteers from the phase 3 clinical trial of the Sinovac vaccine in Indonesia is 1,620 people. Neni said that in cooperation with Sinovac, there was a transfer of vaccine development technology with Indonesia.

According to him, the need for Indonesian vaccines for a large population cannot be fulfilled through cooperation with outsiders. Therefore, it is necessary to be independent in providing the COVID-19 vaccine through a national vaccine consortium.

Bio Farma is working with the Eijkman Institute for Molecular Biology to develop the Red and White vaccine. If Eijkman can deliver vaccine seeds in January 2021, further development is needed at Bio Farma, starting from upscaling, then preclinical testing, clinical trials in phases 1, 2 and 3 to production.

"We hope that there will be assistance and submission of emergency use authorization from the POM, maybe we hope that in 2022 we can fill the gaps in vaccines that are not available from imports from Sinovac or from other countries," said Neni.