Beijing, August 24: The world is eagerly waiting for a vaccine that can prevent coronavirus (COVID-19) infection, China has been giving unapproved vaccines to selected groups of key workers since July. According to Zheng Zhongwei, head of China's coronavirus vaccine development task force, the Chinese government has approved emergency usage of COVID-19 vaccines developed by some select domestic companies and the drug is being administrated to people who are at high risk of getting infected. COVID-19 Vaccine Update: Tunisia to Launch Coronavirus Vaccine in Early 2021.

Speaking to state-run CCTV on Saturday, Zheng said it's been one month since China officially launched the urgent use of COVID-19 vaccines on July 22, while the vaccines were going through clinical trials. Those who were administrated the unapproved vaccines reported few adverse reactions but no fever. This is done under the emergency use authorisation, which is based on Chinese vaccine management law that allows unapproved vaccine candidates to be used among people who are at high risk of getting infected for a limited period of time. COVID-19 Vaccine Update: Donald Trump Mulls Fast-Tracking UK Coronavirus Vaccine Before US Presidential Elections 2020.

"We've drawn up a series of plan packages, including medical consent forms, side-effects monitoring plans, rescuing plans, compensation plans, to make sure that the emergency use is well regulated and monitored," Zheng was quoted as saying. He added the vaccines would be provided to people working in food markets, transport systems and services industries to prevent a possible COVID-19 outbreak in the upcoming autumn and winter.

State-run Global Times had earlier reported that employees of state-owned enterprises (SOEs) preparing to go abroad and frontline medics have been offered two choices of domestic inactivated vaccine candidates developed by Sinopharm for urgent use. One of the inactivated COVID-19 vaccines, developed by Sinopharm, on August 13 was revealed to have had a low rate of adverse reactions for patients in phase I and II clinical trials, while also demonstrating immunogenicity results.

The inactivated vaccine will be effective against all detected strains of the virus at least as of mid-July, with lower chances and degrees of adverse reactions than same-type vaccine candidates under research, Yang Xiaoming, head of Sinopharm, told the Global Times in an earlier interview.

(The above story first appeared on LatestLY on Aug 24, 2020 04:42 PM IST. For more news and updates on politics, world, sports, entertainment and lifestyle, log on to our website latestly.com).