Geneva: The Global Alliance for Vaccines and Immunization (Gavi) said on Monday it has signed two advance purchase agreements with Chinese medicine makers Sinopharm and Sinovac to provide up to 550 million Covid-19 vaccines for the Covax program.
New offers cover up to 170 million doses of synopharm shots and up to 380 million shots from the Sinovac vaccine, until mid 2022, said the statement.
Sinovac confirms the agreement in a statement.
“The agreement, which comes at the time of the Delta variant convey the risk of increasing the health system, will begin to make 110 million doses immediately available for participants of Covax facilities, with options for additional doses,” Gavi said.
Gavi, who runs the scheme of sharing a global covax vaccine with the World Health Organization (WHO) does not immediately provide details of which country will receive a dose.
Shipping can begin quickly because the two vaccines have been given an emergency use listing by WHO, the executive officer Gavi Seth Berkley.
“This is another example of the active GAVI portfolio management strategy, ensuring the facility has the option in dealing with obstacles such as supply delays,” he added.
Covax, which distributes vaccines to poor countries, has struggled to fulfill the initial commitment amid Indian export disorders, forcing many countries to freeze their inoculation programs in their initial phase.
However, the estimated new supply shows that this program is on track to provide more than 2 billion doses in early 2022.
Sinovac and Sinopharm joined nine other vaccines and vaccine candidates have been in this program, including astrazeneca and modern.
Some countries including Thailand and Indonesia that use Sinovac as the first dose turned to another shot for the second dose to increase protection against Covid-19.
Gavi did not immediately respond to a request for comments about whether it was concern about the efficacy of the vaccine.