Chinese pharmaceutical group CanSino Biologics said demand for a Covid-19 vaccine was “dead” in China following the end of the country’s tough zero-Covid policy, underscoring the challenges facing the sector in its biggest unvaccinated market.
CanSino was in the middle of launching a version of the coronavirus vaccine when China lifted its lockdown restrictions in early December. The vaccine has received emergency approval, adding to dozens of domestic vaccines already available to the Chinese public.
Yu Xuefeng, co-founder and chief executive of the Tianjin-based group, said it had rolled out “millions of doses” before “the end of the zero-Covid shock”. But Yu added that the campaign went beyond the virus, which infected about 80 percent of the population within weeks.
“We are trying to deliver the vaccine as quickly as possible to defeat the virus. But at the end of the day, I think the virus is spreading faster than expected,” he said in an interview with the Financial Times.
Chinese health authorities have advised infected patients to wait six months after recovery before receiving a booster shot, causing demand for the vaccine to drop after the majority of the population contracted the virus in a short period of time.
CanSino is developing a messenger RNA vaccine candidate, which Yu said showed “positive results” in phase 2 clinical trials in China. It shows a “high safety profile” and stronger immune response than “inactivated” vaccine technology, according to the company. This could be the first mRNA product to be used for therapy in China if it receives regulatory approval.
Beijing refuses to import BioNTech/Pfizer and Moderna’s mRNA jabs for the domestic population, even though research shows they provide higher levels and longer-lasting protection than the inactive vaccines used by China’s Sinopharm and Sinovac.
CanSino has two research and development teams, one in Tianjin focused on inhaled viral vector vaccines and the second in Shanghai, where more than 200 employees work to develop and manufacture the mRNA jab. Yu said the group has set up a manufacturing site in the southern coastal city to produce about 100 million doses of the mRNA vaccine annually, with the option to reduce production if demand is low.
Yu made the mRNA jab part of the list of booster shots to protect against the new Covid strain, just like the annual flu jab. He estimates the global annual revenue for the industry from the Covid shot will be $5bn. “This is not a small market,” he said.
CanSino announced last month that it was exploring a listing in Switzerland, part of a trend of Chinese groups diversifying their investor base away from the US and China. Hong Kong-listed shares surged as much as 70 percent when it announced approval for the inhaled vaccine in November, but have since fallen 55 percent from that peak.
Additional reporting by Wang Xueqiao in Shanghai