The European Medicines Agency (EMA) announced on Tuesday 4 May that it had initiated a rolling review of the Covid-19 vaccine that has been developed by the Chinese pharmaceutical company Sinovac.
The decision, it explained in a statement, was prompted by preliminary results from laboratory and clinical studies that suggests the vaccine in question “triggers the production of antibodies” against SARS-CoV-2 and “may help protect against the disease”.
In order to assess the benefit/risk ratio of this inactivated vaccine, the EMA will review the data as it is made available. The review “will continue until enough evidence is available for a formal marketing authorisation application”.
The European agency – which is also continuing its ongoing evaluation of the Sputnik, CureVac and Novavax vaccines – has therefore not set a date for issuing its verdict. However, it has given assurances that “it should take less time than normal to evaluate a possible application, since it will build on the work done during the ongoing assessment.
A review of the Chinese vaccines, developed by Sinovac and Sinopharm, is also underway at the World Health Organization and “should be concluded this week”, said the organisation’s deputy director general for vaccine access at a press conference on Monday 3 May. (Original version in French by Agathe Cherki)