Chief Executive Carrie Lam announced that agreements have been reached or will be reached soon for the procurement of three Wuhan pneumonia vaccines, including the Chinese Kexing vaccine, the German pharmaceutical company BioNTech/Fosun’s mRNA vaccine, and the AstraZeneca vaccine, which was developed with the participation of Oxford University in the United Kingdom. The first two vaccines alone amounted to 15 million doses, enough for each Hong Kong resident to receive two shots. She also said that the first one million doses of the vaccine will arrive in Hong Kong next month at the earliest for Hong Kong people to receive, the plan is voluntary, but Hong Kong people can not choose which vaccine to receive. However, with Hong Kong belongs to the Chinese SAR, Macao, the public can choose from the three vaccines provided by the government.
The Hong Kong government’s statement and choice were both questioned yesterday (11). The first Chinese Kexing vaccine to be supplied to Hong Kong may not have completed the third phase of clinical testing, and the third phase of data “may” be made public in January next year, so can the Kexing vaccine be supplied to Hong Kong at the same time? It is even questioned whether the Hong Kong government wants Hong Kong people to receive vaccines whose effectiveness is not yet known. In addition, the earlier rumor that Kexing vaccine has 80% to 97% efficiency is a misrepresentation, and Kexing has clarified that 97% is the rate of antibody in the serum; not to mention Kexing’s previous record of bribing Chinese officials to speed up the approval of influenza vaccine between 2002 and 2011.
The Secretary for Food and Health, Mr. Chan Siu-chee, stressed in a radio program this morning that the vaccine will be purchased only after ensuring its safety, quality assurance and effectiveness, and will be given to a priority group of 3 million people as soon as possible, but the specific vaccination plan still depends on the number of vaccines available and which vaccine arrives first.
Medical experts also called on Hong Kong people not to target vaccines from China, but to look at their data and confirm that they are safe and effective. Among them, Dean of the Faculty of Medicine of the University of Hong Kong Leung Cheuk-wai pointed out that the World Health Organization’s target for the first generation of novel coronavirus vaccine is to have a protection rate of more than 50 percent and to protect against disease, including serious complications, so the first generation of vaccine may not be able to prevent infection, that is, vaccinees may still be invisible carriers of the virus, and Hong Kong people are advised to wear masks after vaccination.
Xu Shuchang, an anti-epidemic expert from the Chinese University of Hong Kong, also said that for the time being, the three manufacturers of vaccines are not 100% protection, but can reduce the severity of the disease after infection. He continued, if the community has 60% to 70% of people through natural infection or vaccination to produce antibodies, it will be possible to achieve the effect of group protection, is expected to Hong Kong until early 2022 to complete vaccination, when it is expected to relax the preventive measures, including whether to wear a mask.
However, the president of the Hong Kong Public Medical Doctors Association, Mr. Ma Zhong Yi Ming, said that based on confidence and the pros and cons of rushing, she personally will not inoculate the first batch of Kexin vaccine for Hong Kong. In addition, the Hong Kong Association of Community Organizations officer Pang Hong-cheong called on the Hong Kong government to improve the transparency of the procurement of vaccines to restore public confidence in the vaccine.
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