China’s first shipment of COVID-19 vaccines arrived at CDMX: SRE received 200,000 doses

This Saturday morning, the first shipment of 200,000 Chinese Sinovac vaccines arrived at Mexico City International Airport and was received by Martha Delgado, Undersecretary for Multilateral Affairs and Human Rights of the Ministry of External Relations (SRE).

Expedition arrived at 8:28 a.m. in the morning and accompanied by the SRE official, Chinese Ambassador to Mexico Zhu Qingqiao and the general manager of Birmex Pedro Zenteno Santaella.

The chancellor Marcelo Ebrard reported this Friday the arrival in Mexico of the first 200,000 doses of the Sinovac vaccine against COVID-19, out of a total of 10,000,000, confirmed.

“Two hundred thousand doses of the Sinovac vaccine have left Hong Kong for CDMX, they will arrive at dawn tomorrow. Ten million more will arrive in the coming weeks. Mexico appreciates the invaluable support of Ambassador of the People’s Republic of China Zhu Qingqiao in achieving this. Thank you!!”, the head of external relations said via his official Twitter account.

Mexican President Andrés Manuel López Obrador argued last Tuesday that there was already an agreement for the first million vaccines.

“Sinovac will conclude the agreement for 1 million vaccines next Monday. Of these vaccines, we will use 200 first and the remaining 800,000 will have to be paid for, ”he said at his morning press conference.

According to the president, the preparation process the vaccine requires about 15 days of rest before being administered. So that most vaccines will remain under protection during this period, “but it is already in our country,” said the president.

The vaccine developed by Chinese pharmaceutical company Sinovac is called CoronaVac and it is about a chemically inactivated version of the SARS-CoV-2 virus, the cause of COVID-19. It is different from other vaccines such as the one developed by Pfizer-BioNTech, which occupies strands of viral DNA to signal the cells of the vaccinated person to produce SARS-CoV-2 virus proteins which are then detected by the system. immune system that develops. defenses against the virus.

In the case of CoronaVac, a “traditional” method is used in which an inactive and safe version of the virus is introduced into the body of the vaccinated person so that the immune system recognizes it and builds the defenses to fight the disease.

Based on the results of phase 1 and 2 clinical trials to assess the safety, tolerability and ability of the vaccine to elicit an immune response in humans, the vaccine is able to protect against COVID-19 without producing serious adverse reactions. For phase 2, a group of 118 people received 6 micrograms of the drug, with a second dose at 28 days. The results revealed a robust immune response: all 118 people vaccinated generated antibodies against the SARS-CoV-2 virus.

In addition, the same study also showed that CoronaVac may produce a sufficient immune response if the second dose of the vaccine is given within 14 days of the first.

Regarding side effects, the Brazilian government, the country where phase 3 clinical trials are being conducted, has revealed that After the first dose, only 19% had local pain at the injection site and 15% had a headache. After the second dose, the Butantan Institute, which is conducting phase 3 clinical trials for CoronaVac, again reported 19% compared to local pain, 10% of people had headaches, 4% of people suffered from fatigue and only 0.1% had a low fever.

Regarding fever, both the progress made by the Butantan Institute and the phase 1 and 2 trials indicate that this It is one of the vaccines that causes the least fever compared to others like Pfizer / BioNTech or AstraZeneca.

The Butanta Institute is also preparing a factory inside the South American country to produce the Chinese vaccine. According to information from the Brazilian government, the Portuguese-speaking country will have the capacity to produce 100 million doses of the vaccine.

So far, the results of phase 3 of the CoronaVac testing. However, these take place in 5 countries: Chile, Brazil, Indonesia, Turkey and China.

Hugo López-Gatell Ramírez, Under Secretary for Prevention and Health Promotion, reported that the Russian COVID-19 Sputnik V vaccine will arrive in Mexico around 11 p.m. on Monday.

The quantity is the same as the shipment from Asian country, and it will be part of the 24 million agreed with the Russian authorities.

Although they did not provide details on which entities will be used for the vaccines which arrived this Saturday, López-Gatell said they would be “two territorial demarcations of Mexico City and a city municipality with a large population“. However, due to the storage conditions of Sputnik V, which requires freezing at -20 degrees Celsius, it is likely to be used in a largely urban area. This way each of the packages will go to a different state.

MORE ON THIS TOPIC: