Page 262 - Keterangan Pers Kepala Badan POM dan Juru Bicara Satgas Penanganan COVID-19 di Istana Kepresidenan Jakarta

Judul : Indonesia mulls local production of China-UAE vaccine

Nama Media : arabnews.com

Tanggal : 2 September 2020

Halaman/URL : https://www.arabnews.com/node/1728596/world
Tipe Media : Online

As Indonesia continues its hunt for a
COVID-19 vaccine for its population of
more than 260 million, authorities on
Wednesday said they are looking into
locally producing a drug that is undergoing
the third phase of clinical trials in Abu
Dhabi.

―There’s the possibility that many people
would require vaccination more than once,
so we’d need to have at least 300 million to 400 million vaccines, therefore we have
to be self-sufficient in vaccine production and development,‖ Indonesian Research
and Technology Minister Bambang Brodjonegoro said on Wednesday.

Penny Lukito, head of the Food and Drug Monitoring Agency (BPOM), said
Indonesia and the UAE have talked about the possibility of ―manufacturing the
vaccine‖ — which is being developed by Abu Dhabi-based G42 Healthcare and
China’s vaccine manufacturer Sinopharm CNBG — to boost the drug’s production
and supply.
It follows her visit to Abu Dhabi on Aug. 24-26, when she met with the assistant
undersecretary of health policy and licensing at the UAE’s Ministry of Health, the
acting undersecretary of the Abu Dhabi Department of Health, the CEO of G42 and a
Sinopharm representative. Lukito also visited the vaccine-testing center at the Abu
Dhabi National Exhibition Centre.
She said she had discussed with the G42 CEO the ―possibility‖ of Indonesia’s
pharma industry being part of the vaccine commercial production chain — to be used
in Indonesia and abroad — because the UAE’s vaccine is ―still in its early phase.‖

Indonesia’s state-owned vaccine manufacturer Bio Farma, in preparation to produce
vaccines such as the one developed by Chinese company Sinovac — whose
vaccine is undergoing the third phase of clinical trials in the Indonesian city of
Bandung — is boosting its capacity to produce up to 250 million doses next year.
The talks on Indonesia being part of the vaccine production program follow an
agreement for the supply of 10 million doses of a yet-to-be-imported vaccine later
this year.