Brazil suspended evaluation of Sputnik V coronavirus vaccine

Anvisa, Brazil’s health regulator, said on Sunday it had suspended the deadline to consider a request for emergency use of Russia’s Sputnik V coronavirus vaccine. In a statement on their website, Anvisa assured that União Química, the company that will manufacture the injections in Brazil, did not present the necessary documentation.

“Despite the suspension of the deadline, Anvisa continues to analyze the other information presented by União Química,” he said in his press release.

According to the Anvisa website, the regulator’s time to consider emergency use requests is seven or 30 working days.

Brazil joined the club of nations producing its own covid vaccine on Friday in response to a pandemic. Hours apart and from different political parties, the state of Sao Paulo and the government of Jair Bolsonaro have announced that two covid-19 vaccines are being developed in parallel, although it will take several months before to be able to use them.

At a press conference early this Friday, São Paulo governor Joao Doria, Bolsonaro’s rival, was the first to announce the new local vaccine, dubbed Butanvac, and said it should start to be applied next July. .

“This is a historic announcement for the world,” Doria said at a press conference to a panel with the name of the new vaccine next to the Brazilian flag and the message “Butanvac, the 100% national vaccine”.

The Butantan Institute is already producing the Coronavac vaccine in Brazil, from the Chinese laboratory Sinovac, the most widely used in the country and which is applied 90% of the time in the process of the South American giant’s nascent vaccination.

Brazil also produces the AztraZeneca-Oxford vaccine from the FioCruz Institute, linked to the federal government.

And hours later, officials from the Bolsonaro government reported on efforts to obtain another vaccine, developed by a Brazilian university and which has already submitted approval to conduct testing. “It is not necessary to do one fact with another. It is perhaps even a coincidence (announced the same day), but it is very good for the country, because it is necessary to have national vaccines ”, affirmed the Minister of Science and Technology, Marcos Pontes.

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307,112 Brazilians have died from Covid-19 since the start of the pandemic, according to government data, a higher death toll than any other country outside the United States. In recent weeks, Brazil has overtaken the United States in daily infections and deaths, making its Covid-19 outbreak the worst in the world.

The country, of 212 million inhabitants, is facing the “biggest health and hospital collapse” in its history, according to the Fiocruz Foundation. Of the 27 states, 25 have an ICU occupation equal to or greater than 80%. AND hospitalization of a younger population increases the pressure.

In 18 states, there is a shortage of drugs such as neuromuscular blockers, which are used when patients are on ventilators. In six states, the oxygen supply is dangerously low, according to the Department of Health. The National Governors Forum warns that shortages threaten to cause “collapse within collapse.”

The variant first discovered in the western city of Manaus has been responsible for the dramatic increase in infections and deaths and has been detected in the United States, Europe and other parts of Latin America.

The country’s neighbors are slamming their doors. Peru, Colombia and Argentina have suspended flights from the country. Only two of the top ten destination countries for Brazilians are still open to them. “If Brazil is not taken seriously, it will continue to affect the entire neighborhood there and beyond,” warned Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, director of the World Health Organization.

With information from Reuters and EFE

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