AMMAN
— Recent comments from a Chinese medical official have raised questions about
the efficacy of the Sinopharm vaccine, which has been widely distributed in
Jordan. But Jordanian health experts do not seem worried.
اضافة اعلان
The
efficacy of the Chinese coronavirus vaccines is "not high" and the
jabs may require improvements, said the head of the Chinese Center for Disease
Control and Prevention, as reported by international media last week. The
official also suggested that recipients may need to mix vaccines that are made
with different technologies.
Jordan
has relied heavily on Sinopharm, one of the Chinese-made vaccines, to inoculate
the population, in addition to the Pfizer-NBiotech and AstraZeneca vaccines.
Earlier in April, 196,000 doses of Sinopharm arrived, according to Minister of
Health Firas Al-Hawari.
Former
Jordanian minister of health and current adviser for government affairs for the
Middle East and North Africa at Hikma Pharmaceuticals, Salah Mawajdeh,
attributed concerns around Sinopharm to the fact that the company has not
shared detailed clinical data findings.
“I
am not personally worried about this issue because one has to rely on other
sources of data to make a judgment,” he said in a message to Jordan News.
“China
itself is using it and they have controlled the spread of the epidemic. Other
countries using it are not reporting issues of safety and effectiveness. The
exception is Latin America, which is using SinoVac. In Jordan, we are using Sinopharm
which is much better in terms of performance.”
Sinopharm’s
efficacy data has been mixed, hindered in part by the fact that China, where
the vaccine is produced and has been widely distributed, had very low rates of
COVID-19 due to severe lockdowns even before the vaccination campaign began.
Sinopharm achieved
79 percent efficacy in a Phase III study conducted in 10 countries, and the United
Arab Emirates has reported that the vaccine has 86 percent efficacy. This is
comparatively lower than the Pfizer and Moderna mRNA vaccines, which have
reported over 95 percent efficacy, but still significantly higher than many
basic influenza vaccines, which range in efficacy from 30 to 60 percent.
According
to Ahmad Sarahneh, head of the Health Committee at the Lower House, the legislature
will pressure the health minister to stop administering the vaccine if efficacy
data find that it is less than 70 percent effective. He pointed out that the
statements from China come after the emergence of new variants of COVID-19,
which present challenges for all vaccines.
The
World Health Organization (WHO) has not yet approved the Sinopharm vaccine for
emergency use; according to a
WHO document, Sinopharm has submitted a dossier for approval and they
anticipate that a decision will be issued by the end of April.
In
the UAE, officials have experimented with administering three shots of the
Sinopharm vaccine rather than two after there were reports that some recipients
had low antibody counts.
Some
Jordanians have expressed a preference for Sinopharm, because it uses the
“old-school” inactivated virus methodology. This mechanism, which involves
injecting a killed virus particle to trigger the production of antibodies, has
been used for over a century in common vaccines such as the rabies vaccine
(first developed in the 1880s), the typhoid vaccine (developed in the 1890s),
and the polio vaccine (developed in 1950). In contrast, the Pfizer-NBiotech and
Moderna vaccines use a novel mRNA technology to inoculate recipients.
Sinopharm’s
relatively low efficacy also raises questions about the idea of “vaccine
passports” or other certificates allowing people to show proof of vaccination
to travel freely. Several American universities, including Yale and Columbia,
have already announced that students will be required to get vaccinated before
returning to campus in the fall. They did not specify which vaccines would
satisfy the requirement.
The
European Union (EU) has said that they will launch vaccine passports in June to restore free travel for those who have immunity. In
February, the EU gathered to discuss the possibility of vaccine passports. But
according to media reports, they identified a problem: some countries, such as
Hungary, have been administering Sinopharm and other vaccines that have not
been approved by the EU.
Restrictions
for travelers without EU-approved vaccines have already had consequences. In
Poland, individuals wishing to enter the country will either have to provide a
negative coronavirus test or proof of vaccination — and vaccines not approved
by the EU, such as Sinopharm, don’t count.
Earlier
in April, the WHO announced that they opposed the introduction of “vaccine passports” as a
requirement for entering or exiting certain countries, citing concerns over
whether vaccination prevents transmission and equity concerns.
According
to Mawajdeh, it is “too early” to judge whether a Sinopharm jab will disrupt
Jordanians seeking to travel to other countries. “Getting immunity is not just
through vaccination,” he pointed out. “The disease itself gives immunity so
there is no sense in asking everyone to get vaccinated in order to travel
freely.”
Of
course, a lower efficacy vaccine still provides more protection than no vaccine
at all. Mawajdeh said that Jordanians should “definitely” take the Sinopharm
vaccine.
Despite
multiple attempts, Jordan News was
unable to reach concerned officials at the Ministry of Health to obtain a
comment for this story. The WHO was also unavailable for comment.
Read more national news
.jpg)
.jpg)
