China's Covid-19 vaccine candidate elicits antibody response, early-stage findings show

BEIJING: China's Covid-19 vaccine candidate elicits an antibody response against coronavirus, findings published in The Lancet Infectious Diseases journal on Thursday said. These findings were the result of a small early-phase randomized clinical trial of the Chinese Covid-19 vaccine candidate which is based on the inactivated whole SARS-CoV-2 virus.

Trials for this vaccine candidate were carried out in China between April 29 and July 30 this year. It involved researchers from multiple institutions, including the Beijing Institute of Biological Products.

According to a report by news agency Reuters, the findings of this early-stage trial point out that the vaccine candidate prompted antibody responses in all recipients within 42 days. The report cites findings published in the Lancet Infectious Diseases journal to affirm that the vaccine candidate is safe since no serious adverse reaction occurred in the case of any of the participants during the trials.

More than 600 healthy volunteers aged between 18 and 80 years old participated in these early-stage trials for China's Covid-19 vaccine candidate.

The research team reiterated that the objective of early-stage trials is to assess the safety of the vaccine and the immune response it induces. This, researchers reiterated, is not enough to confirm whether this vaccine candidate is enough to protect recipients from Covid-19.

Researchers did, however, state that the findings of these early-stage clinical trials will prove useful during phase-3 clinical trials of China's Covid-19 vaccine candidate.

China has four Covid-19 vaccines in the final stage of clinical trials, at least three of which have already been made available to essential workers under an emergency programme initiated in July.

Data released by the World Health Organisation (WHO) suggests that more than 40 Covid-19 vaccine candidates are undergoing clinical trials. The novel coronavirus has infected 3,95,88,293 people across the globe while claiming 11,08,576 lives.