RIO DE JANEIRO (Reuters) – A first shipment of 88 liters of active ingredients to produce the AstraZeneca COVID-19 vaccine in Brazil arrived from China on Saturday, a key contribution to accelerating the country’s troubled vaccination program.
With these supplies transported to Rio de Janeiro by cargo plane, the Fiocruz biomedical center can begin filling and completing 2.8 million doses. The federally funded center expects to receive more ingredients this month to take a total of 15 million photos of the vaccine developed in conjunction with Oxford University.
The Fiocruz production line, originally scheduled to start production in December, remained inactive due to delays in obtaining the first supply of supplies from China.
The AstraZeneca Plc vaccine is the central pillar of Brazil’s national inoculation program, and the federal government has ordered the materials for Fiocruz to take up to 100 million photos.
To start inoculating its 210 million people, Brazil initially relied on the Chinese vaccine developed by Sinovac Biotech Ltd and 2 million ready-to-use AstraZeneca shots imported from India last month.
Pfizer Inc. on Friday sought full regulatory approval in Brazil for its COVID-19 vaccine developed in conjunction with BioNTech Se, the company said.
It is the second vaccine submitted for registration in Brazil. AstraZeneca applied for full regulatory approval for its vaccine on January 29th.
President Jair Bolsonaro, who says he will not make any COVID-19 fires, is under pressure after the slow and uneven launch of the vaccine in Brazil, which is now facing a second wave of infections.
Bolsonaro referred to the virus as “little flu”, but his government faces growing criticism over the management of the world’s second outbreak of coronavirus, which has killed more than 231,000 Brazilians.
The Butantan Biomedical Institute in Sao Paulo said on Saturday that it has begun supplementing and completing 8.6 million doses of Sinovac vaccine called Coronavac with ingredients that arrived from China on Wednesday.
Butantan said it expects to receive another amount of ingredients on Wednesday to make another 8.7 million doses.
Reports by Sergio Queiroz, Scris by Anthony Boadle; Mountainous of David Gregorio