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The US vaccine is a good vaccine, but it cannot save China from the epidemic

2022-12-26T00:19:12.776Z


As the epidemic situation in China is becoming more and more serious, the United States has recently expressed its willingness to provide vaccines to China many times. The political struggle narrative behind this is too grand. What ordinary Chinese people are most concerned about is whether the American vaccine


As the epidemic situation in China is becoming increasingly severe, the United States has recently expressed its willingness to provide vaccines to China many times. The political struggle narrative behind this is too grand. Ordinary Chinese people are most concerned about whether American vaccines can save China from the epidemic.

Judging from the fact that a large number of mainland tourists have recently made a special trip to Macau to receive the messenger ribonucleic acid (mRNA) vaccine, many people believe that the US vaccine can provide better protection.

But that's just a personal choice.

There are 1.4 billion people in China. The Chinese government has been slow to approve the US vaccine. In addition to political considerations, there are also practical problems that cannot be overcome in a short time.

cost issue

In terms of cost, the storage conditions required by the US Pfizer vaccine and the Moderna vaccine are very harsh.

The Pfizer vaccine can only be stored for 5 days at 2°C to 8°C, and can be stored for 6 months at minus 80°C to minus 60°C.

The Moderna vaccine can be stored for 30 days at 2°C to 8°C, and for 6 months at minus 80°C to minus 60°C.

The picture shows the comparison of the effectiveness of major vaccines in European and American countries.

Pfizer and Moderna have successively announced that their vaccines are more than 90% effective.

The effective rate of China’s Kexing vaccine is 51%, and the effective rate of Sinopharm’s vaccine is 79%.

(Screenshot of WHO website)

The depth of China's territory and population determine that if American vaccines are used on a large scale, it is unrealistic to temporarily build a huge freezing facility for vaccine administration.

CanSino vaccines, Sinopharm vaccines, and Kexing vaccines currently produced in China are stored at a normal temperature of 2 degrees Celsius to 8 degrees Celsius, which is the same as the storage conditions of existing rabies vaccines and hepatitis A vaccines. The use of these vaccines is essentially not Substantially increase the cost.

China itself has also carried out the research and development of mRNA vaccines. The Chinese-made mRNA vaccines, which were urgently put into use in Indonesia in September this year, can be stored at 2-8 degrees Celsius and can be stored and transported under conventional cold chain conditions without thawing before use.

In terms of cost performance, instead of spending more to use American vaccines, China certainly hopes to use Chinese-made mRNA vaccines that do not require more costs when conditions are ripe.

For developing countries with insufficient medical and health resources, this is a very important practical issue.

Vaccine availability

American vaccines have been widely used, and many people in the medical field believe that they are more advanced and have a higher protection rate. It seems that the Chinese government should not give up such a superior good thing.

In fact, whether to use it or not depends not simply on whether it is good or not, but more importantly, whether it is suitable or not.

If there is room to choose a better vaccine, no country will settle for a vaccine with a lower protective effect.

In the past three years, countries have been rushing to buy vaccines, and it is not easy to get any vaccine.

The most fundamental reason why Chinese vaccines are widely used in Africa, Southeast Asia and the Middle East is their cost-effectiveness.

This is a market choice behavior.

It is the basic logic to give priority to choosing vaccines that are available within the capacity.

Asking why China doesn't use American vaccines is more like a stupid question like why not eat minced meat.

Moderna vaccine.

(Photo by Wu Yihua)

At the moment when the spread of the epidemic is counted by the day, China has established a basic vaccine protection barrier, and what it can do is to quickly promote the vaccine penetration rate along the existing well-established channels, instead of starting a new one and spending a lot of time to fight the US vaccine.

Social stability is the red line

China is a big country that is moving toward modernization. In its long history, a very important governance experience is not to worry about scarcity but to worry about inequality.

If the American vaccine, which is considered to be more effective, enters the Chinese market, it is still unknown whether it will cause social chaos and scramble to fight.

From this point of view, it is hard to say that it is irresponsible not to introduce American vaccines.

Governing a big country is like cooking small fish. Whether China will introduce American vaccines depends on whether the timing is ripe and the consequences are controllable.

The mRNA vaccine produced in China has been authorized for emergency use in Indonesia in September 2022. It is technically mature, but when it is put into use in China, it will also need to go through a more stringent approval process.

Therefore, it is not that China does not approve the mRNA vaccine from the United States, but that the entire Chinese society has not started to use any mRNA vaccine.

Singapore studies different new crown vaccines, infection and severe disease rates, and uses Pfizer's Fubitai vaccine as a reference value.

The risk of severe disease from vaccination with Kexing is five times higher than that of Fubitai.

(Screenshot of the Singapore research report)

China will not disapprove US vaccines purely for political purposes.

When Chinese mRNA vaccines can be mass-produced on a large scale, market balance and social stability can be taken into account, whether to approve the US vaccine will not be a problem.

The United States is willing to provide vaccines. I believe China is willing to regard this as a goodwill of support, but it must also consider whether China can digest this goodwill and whether it has the conditions to accept it.

China's population is 1.41 billion, while that of the United States is 330 million.

If China wants to use American vaccines, can the United States supply 1.4 billion people with American vaccines?

If enough vaccines are not available, a small number of vaccines is nothing more than a pack of explosives for social unrest.

It cannot be inferred that China has malicious intentions against the United States just because the goodwill of the United States has not been realized.

More than 10,000 doses of Fubitai’s new crown vaccine arrived in Beijing to provide vaccinations for German citizens living in China Urging the public to change the vaccine for the fourth dose The number of mainland tourists who go to Macau to receive Fubitai vaccine has increased significantly. Fosun Pharma is considering increasing the number of vaccination sites

Source: hk1

All news articles on 2022-12-26

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