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While China awaits WHO approval for its vaccines, one country returns its own

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Instead, it sparked a storm of criticism against Duterte: for choosing a vaccine not yet approved by the country’s regulators.

In the middle of the reaction, Duterte on Wednesday asked China to recover the 1,000 doses of the Sinopharm vaccine he had given in the Philippines and apologize to the public for receiving the unapproved shot.
Duterte said he had told the Chinese ambassador to stop sending Sinopharm. “Just give us Sinovac, which is being used by everyone,” he said, according to local media, in reference to another Chinese vaccine that was granted emergency use in the Philippines in February.

Duterte’s rough view of Sinopharm’s traits highlights the regulatory bar that Chinese vaccines face in the absence of emergency approval by the World Health Organization (WHO), although the features have been approved for use in dozens of countries.

When Sinopharm requested emergency use with the Philippine Food and Drug Administration (FDA) in early March, the agency’s director dit which, as in the case of Sinovac, would take longer to decide on Sinopharm’s application because it had not been approved by a “strict regulatory authority,” such as the WHO.
But that could soon change. the WHO he said at a press conference Monday that he hoped to finalize decisions on approving emergency use both sent Sinopharm and Sinovac vaccines “later this week.”

A WHO endorsement may finally boost confidence in Chinese vaccines, which have long faced concerns about efficacy rates and a lack of transparency regarding clinical trial data.

The features of Sinopharm and Sinovac are inactivated vaccines, which have a lower efficacy than mRNA vaccines produced by Pfizer-BioNTech and Moderna. And, unlike their Western counterparts, the two Chinese companies have not released full data from their latest clinical studies conducted around the world, which have received criticism from scientists and health experts.

According to Sinopharm and Sinovac, their vaccines obtained different efficacy results in trials conducted in different countries, but all exceeded the WHO 50% efficacy threshold for emergency approval.

Its approval could be timely for COVAX, the WHO-supported global initiative to ensure equitable access to Covid-19 vaccines. In recent weeks, it has faced a severe shortage of supplies from India, which halted the export of the AstraZeneca vaccine amid its Covid-19 crisis.

Because COVAX can only distribute WHO-approved vaccines, Chinese vaccines have not yet been included in its portfolio. Instead, you should rely on Pfizer-BioNTech, AstraZeneca, Covishield Serum Institute of India, Johnson & Johnson, Modern, which are in high demand.

Instead, China has been making its own vaccine donations through bilateral agreements with different countries, including the Philippines, an effort experts say is guided more by China’s strategic interests than by the needs of the most vulnerable countries.

Undoubtedly, WHO approval will increase Beijing’s vaccination diplomacy. But more importantly, it should help provide better protection against Covid-19 in countries with more needs.

Around Asia

China’s business: cinemas show old propaganda films. Will Hollywood lose?

Beijing has ordered Chinese cinemas to do so use this year’s box office to spread propaganda celebrating the Communist Party. Fans of the country’s films don’t have it, and are worried that the new term is eliminating some of the Hollywood films they claim.

Chinese moviegoers revolted last month after major ticketing sites across the country stopped quietly promoting screenings for the re-release of the three “Lord of the Rings” films. At the same time, the films were disappearing, the films of decades ago that promoted the party and that the regulators favored flooded the theaters ’theaters.

The China Film Administration has ordered cinemas to screen at least two old films a week until the end of the year, in honor of the 100th anniversary of the founding of the Chinese Communist Party.

The children watch a propaganda film

The China Film Administration has not released public statements calling for Hollywood films to be removed from theaters, but industry analysts and film enthusiasts were quick to blame regulators, who believed they were the obvious culprits. Many fans criticized the decision on social media and even pledged not to go to the movies.

And as the “Lord of the Rings” films finally return to theaters, analysts point out that the dust illustrates some of the major challenges Beijing faces in trying to instill party loyalty in young people and strengthen industries. such as film production.

– By Laura He

Cited and noted

“We have always understood the single system, the two-country agreement and we will continue to follow our policies there … One country, two systems, I should say.”

– Australian Prime Minister Scott Morrison is corrected but he is still wrong when he speaks of the country’s policy toward Taiwan. “One country, two systems” is the principle by which China took control of Hong Kong, and was thought of as a potential model for future unification with Taiwan, but does not apply to – and has been widely rejected. by the self-controlled island.
World leaders attend a U.S. climate summit on April 22, 2021.

Climate problems

Chinese President Xi Jinping has promised its country to be carbon neutral by 2060, and climate policy is seen as an important area of ​​cooperation, and even competition – between the United States and China.
But a new report shows how difficult it could be to reduce China’s climate impact: the country’s emissions exceeded those of all developed nations combined in 2019, according to researchers from the Rhodium group.

According to the report, global emissions reached 52 gigatonnes of CO2 equivalent in 2019, an increase of 11.4% in the last decade. Of this, China contributed 27% of total global emissions, more than double that of the US, the second highest emitter, with 11%. India ranks third, with 6.6% of global emissions, ahead of the European Union.

Although per capita emissions in China remained lower in 2019 than in the US (10.1 tonnes compared to 17.6 tonnes per person), the report predicts that when full 2020 data is available, the country’s per capita production will have exceeded the OECD average of 10.5 tonnes, although emissions “from almost every other nation fell sharply as a result of the Covid-19 pandemic”.

However, China still has a long way to go before it recovers the total amount of carbon that developed countries have spilled into the atmosphere. The report notes that “since 1750, members of the OECD bloc have emitted four times as much CO2 cumulatively as China.”

Image of the day

Welcome back: A couple hugs outside Beijing Railway Station on the last Labor Day holiday on May 5, 2021. China is back to work completely on Friday.

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