The Wall Street Journal reports that China is expanding the use of its Neocrown vaccine outside of clinical trials, and that Sinopharm is offering experimental vaccines that have not been formally approved to students who will be studying abroad. Western experts say that China is moving too quickly and potentially endangering public health.
China National Biotech Group, a subsidiary of Sinopharm, is reportedly developing two new vaccines for crowns. Sinopharm is offering its unapproved vaccines for free to Chinese students planning to study abroad, according to the company’s website and to students applying for the vaccines.
The move seems to indicate that the company is using the emergency use authorization to provide the vaccine to hundreds of thousands of people outside of clinical trials, according to the report.
As China prepares to make the vaccine available to the public as early as next month, many Western health experts and pharmaceutical companies have warned that the Chinese government and companies may be subjecting the public to vaccines that have not been proven safe and effective, according to the report.
Lawrence Gostin, a professor of global health law at Georgetown University, was quoted in the report as saying, “By doing this, China is setting the wrong example for the world.” “People will think it (the vaccine) is effective, so they will let their guard down,”
Yang Xiaoming, chairman of China Biotechnology Corporation, told official media in August that “the safety of the vaccine is well assured.” He is among the Chinese officials who have publicly declared in recent months that they have been vaccinated, along with other vaccinators including Wu Guizhen, chief biosafety expert at the CDC, and Gao Fu, director of the Center for Disease Control and Prevention.
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