Chile to purchase 1.8 million vaccines from Chinese lab

Chilean President Sebastián Piñera announced that the country reached an agreement with Chinese lab CanSino Biologics to acquire 1.8 million doses of the single-shot Ad5-nCoV coronavirus vaccine. 

Celebrating that Chile “has vaccinated more than 6.4 million people” — the fastest vaccine rollout in Latin America so far — Mr. Piñera said that additional purchases are important to “maintain this immunization rate.” 

Chile’s national vaccination campaign currently uses jabs from Pfizer and Sinovac, both of which require two doses to be effective. Clinical trials on the Ad5-nCoV vaccine took place in five countries — including Chile — and achieved over 90-percent efficacy for severe Covid-19 cases. 

Health Minister Enrique Paris said a new meeting to discuss further steps will take place on April 7, and that Chilean regulators could approve CanSino Biologics’ vaccine between May and June. 

Though vaccination is progressing at a health pace, Chile is enduring one of its worst coronavirus peaks, and decided to put 70 percent of its population under quarantine in late March to contain the virus. As of today, the country has recorded 1 million Covid-19 cases and over 23,000 deaths. 

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