Pakistan to import Chinese Cansino vaccine in bulk to package 3m doses locally: Asad

Pakistan will import Chinese Cansino Biologics Covid-19 vaccines in bulk to package three million doses locally, Minister for Planning and Development Asad Umar said on Tuesday.

"We will be getting the bulk vaccine by mid-April from Cansino, from which 3 million doses can be made," Umar said on Twitter.

"The bulk vaccine received will be formulated, sterilised and packed in Pakistan. For this purpose special equipment has been procured and manpower is being trained," he said.

Meanwhile, the first batch of 60,000 doses of the vaccine is arriving today, he said.

Cansino's vaccine is one of the four approved by the Drug Regulatory Authority of Pakistan (Drap), the other three being China's Sinopharm, Russia's Sputnik-V and the Oxford University-AstraZeneca vaccine.

The company had last month released the interim efficacy results of a multi-country trial, which included Pakistan, showing 65.7 per cent efficacy in preventing symptomatic coronavirus cases and a 90.98pc success rate in stopping severe infections.

In the Pakistani subset, the efficacy of the vaccine at preventing symptomatic cases was 74.8pc and 100pc at preventing severe disease.

Pakistan also expects to receive one million doses of Sinopharm vaccine in a couple of days.