Vaccine developers Pfizer and BioNTech plan to roll out the first doses of their Covid-19 vaccine within weeks, once they receive emergency use permissions from regulators. They expect to have 1.3 billion doses ready next year. Pfizer and BioNTech could secure emergency U.S. and European authorization for using their Covid-19 vaccine next month. Of the 170 volunteers who contracted Covid-19 in Pfizer’s trial involving over 43,000 people, 162 had received a placebo and not the vaccine, meaning the vaccine was 95% effective. Conditional approval in the European Union could be secured in the second half of December, while deliveries could start before Christmas. AstraZeneca and Oxford University’s potential Covid-19 vaccine produced a strong immune response in older adults, data showed, with researchers expecting to release late-stage trial results by Christmas.

But despite these two announcements, Chinese vaccine makers said that China’s development of Covid-19 vaccines remains in the lead. China’s leading vaccine producer Sinopharm told the Global Times that it has reported the phase-III clinical data to China’s relevant regulators. The vaccine maker, claiming it is in the final stage before marketing, stressed that it is not under pressure to reveal its vaccine data and will do so in a more scientific and controlled way. Another leading inactivated vaccine producer, Sinovac, said that it will not release the relevant data until it is assured to obtain sufficient Covid-19 cases in its double-blind, placebo-controlled trials to certify vaccine effectiveness. The release is expected by the end of November. Five Chinese vaccine candidates are under clinical phase-III trials in countries including the UAE, Brazil, Pakistan and Peru, and phase-I and II clinical trials of other candidates have been accelerated. Sinopharm’s two inactivated vaccines have been administered to nearly one million people for emergency use and no serious adverse reactions have been reported. Nearly 60,000 volunteers have participated in the phase-III clinical trials in more than 10 countries.

How to ensure transportation of Covid-19 vaccines has become a hot topic for the global cargo industry. The International Air Transport Association (IATA) said that delivering billions of doses of a vaccine that must be transported and stored in a deep-frozen state to the entire world efficiently will involve hugely complex logistical challenges across the supply chain. Market watchers believe that the prospect of vaccine transportation may stimulate the recovery of the aviation market, especially the cargo industry. Cai Guoxian, regional head of North Asia with the IATA, said at an industry forum held in Zhengzhou, Henan province, that assuming one dose per person in the world, billions of doses of vaccine would need to be transported, requiring 8,000 Boeing 747 freighters, which will lend strong support to the cargo industry.

Small local outbreaks are emerging in several Chinese cities. Shanghai reported five new confirmed locally transmitted Covid-19 cases and three communities in the Pudong New Area where the patients live have been designated as medium-risk areas. A cargo security inspector at Pudong International Airport and his wife, a nurse at Pudong Hospital, were confirmed as two new locally transmitted Covid-19 cases and three people were found infected during the follow-up contact tracing. Shanghai Pudong Hospital has suspended its daily outpatient and emergency services. A total of 4,015 medical staff, workers and patients have been quarantined in the hospital. People in the medium-risk areas are not allowed to leave Shanghai unless in an emergency. The first of Shanghai’s latest coronavirus infections emerged in two airport cargo handlers who cleaned a container that arrived on a flight from North America. The container was damp inside and sealed off. Airport officials have tested 17,719 employees at Pudong airport’s cargo handling area. A tests turned out negative, but a FedEx (China) employee was confirmed as a new Covid-19 cases on November 23. Since November 9, six freight transport workers at the airport have been confirmed positive for Covid-19. The wives of two of the staffers are also confirmed as infected. The confirmed cases have only been found at the airport’s cargo handling area, and the airport’s passenger area is unaffected.

Five new locally transmitted cases were also confirmed in Tianjin. Authorities started conducting nucleic acid tests for 2.24 million residents in the Binhai New Area, to be completed in two to three days. Two cold-chain storage workers were among the infected, as the country shifts focus to contaminated imports after a number of outbreaks linked to frozen food. Around 1,900 residents are under centralized quarantine. As of November 20, Tianjin had reported seven confirmed cases of Covid-19 and five asymptomatic cases. Two cities in Fujian province said they found traces of the virus in shipments of pomfret fish from India and beef from Argentina. Three new locally transmitted cases were reported in Manzhouli, a city in Inner Mongolia bordering Russia’s Far East. All 300,000 residents of the city have been tested.

In Wuhan, authorities said earlier they had detected the virus on frozen beef from Brazil, while several other cities reported positive test results on samples from imported food, including Argentinian pork and Indian cuttlefish. Customs officials have temporarily suspended imports from some suppliers. Mass-testing campaigns have been rolled out after reports of coronavirus traces on imported food and packaging, with state TV showing workers disinfecting transport trucks and inspecting packages of frozen salmon. Wu Zunyou, Chief Epidemiologist at the Chinese Center for Disease Control and Prevention, told the Global Times that low temperatures in winter make the international freight environment similar to a cold chain, creating a “cold chain” effect on all imported goods.

Air France’s flight from Paris to Shanghai has been suspended by China’s civil aviation regulator for a week from November 23. Flight AF198 was suspended after six passengers on a flight from Paris tested positive for Covid-19 on November 6, the Civil Aviation Administration of China (CAAC) said. The weekly flight was one of the earliest international flights to Shanghai to resume after the coronavirus outbreak.

Addressing the Group of 20 Riyadh Summit via video link, Chinese President Xi Jinping proposed building a “global firewall” against Covid-19, reducing tariffs and barriers as well as tapping into the booming digital economy to battle the pandemic and reboot the world economy. “To contain the virus, stabilize the economy and protect livelihood remains a long and arduous journey for all countries,” Xi said.

This overview is based on reports by The Global Times, China Daily, Shanghai Daily and The Guardian.

Health authorities in several cities with new local Covid-19 infections urged residents to stay vigilant and reiterated the use of personal hygiene and protection measures, including wearing masks, maintaining social distancing and paying attention to food safety. In recent days, three new confirmed cases have been reported – in Tianjin, Shanghai and Fuyang, Anhui province. In Tianjin, large-scale nucleic acid testing was conducted on 77,000 residents of the Hangu subdistrict and two blocks neighboring a cold-chain logistics area at the central fishing port in the city’s Binhai New Area.

The areas were classified as medium-risk for Covid-19 after a 38-year-old man, who works at a loading dock of a cold storage company, tested positive, becoming a confirmed Covid-19 patient. Officials urged residents in medium-risk areas not to leave their communities. The coronavirus found to have infected the Tianjin patient was very similar to the strain that spread in North America between March and June, local government officials said. The man tested positive after he handled a shipment of frozen pork. Samples of the outer packaging of the pork, which arrived in Tianjin on October 19 from Germany, tested positive for coronavirus. Tianjin also reported an asymptomatic case – a 48-year-old man who is a stevedore at Tianjin Dongjiang Free Trade Port Zone in the Binhai New Area. A second man, 47, a driver who went to the facilities where the confirmed patient worked and who loaded frozen food, was reported as an asymptomatic case. In Yunnan province, the Gengma autonomous county reported two new asymptomatic Covid-19 infections in individuals from Myanmar. Residents in three communities were required to complete 14 days of home quarantine and schools were suspended.

Shanghai’s government said that all 8,717 people in the city with ties to a confirmed local Covid-19 patient – a 51-year-old man who works as a cargo handler at Shanghai Pudong International Airport – had tested negative for the virus. Twenty-six people who had close contact with the confirmed patient and 186 people who interacted with those individuals have also been quarantined at designated hotels, according to the authorities. A confirmed Covid-19 case, a close contact of the Shanghai patient, was reported in Fuyang, Anhui province. The 50-year-old man also worked as a stevedore at Shanghai Pudong International Airport, the China Daily reports. An increasing number of Shanghai residents are taking tests for coronavirus at designated hospitals before traveling to other cities where negative results may be required.

It is estimated that there have been at least 30 coronavirus cases detected in China in imported food cold chains since the first case in July. Up to now, more than 873,500 samples had been tested by Customs across China, among which 13 had positive nucleic acid test results, media reported. China also has reported more than 3,600 imported cases, and the number has increased rapidly since October. The current daily average of imported cases is 16.6, up 45% since September. China has stopped issuing visas to some foreign nationals while restricting non urgent outbound travel by Chinese citizens, Yin Chengji, Deputy Director of the National Immigration Administration (NIA), told reporters.

China remains vigilant, as more cases may emerge in winter. There might be sporadic cases in some areas in China and some pocket cluster cases in others, Li Bin, Vice Chairman of the National Health Commission, said. “China’s epidemic prevention and control work cannot be relaxed for a single moment,” he added. The country has also done random checks on more than 870,000 samples of imported frozen food, said Bi Kexin, an official at the General Administration of Customs. It is demanding certification from suppliers, and market regulators are taking tougher measures against untraceable frozen food, said Chen Xu, an official at the State Administration for Market Regulation. Chinese respiratory disease expert Zhong Nanshan called for sustained international collaboration in the battle against the Covid-19 pandemic and greater attention to asymptomatic cases, citing relatively strong infectivity.

Brazil resumed the trials of a Chinese Covid-19 vaccine after halting them briefly following the death of a participant in the trial, which was later classified as a possible suicide and thus not related to the vaccine test. The vaccine candidate tested in Brazil is developed by the Chinese firm Sinovac Biotech (Sinovac). A scheduled shipment of Sinovac’s vaccine to Brazil of about 150,000 to 160,000 doses at the end of the month is still being processed. Joao Doria, the Governor of Sao Paulo state where the vaccine is being tested, called the suspension of the study the result of a “domestic political war” with President Jair Bolsonaro, who had previously declared that Brazil would not buy Chinese vaccines.

China National Pharmaceutical Group Co (Sinopharm), is stepping up efforts to develop Covid-19 vaccine candidates, the China Daily reports. Third-stage clinical trials of its two inactivated vaccine candidates, developed by the company’s vaccine and bioscience subsidiary China National Biotech Group (CNBG), are being conducted in 10 countries, including the United Arab Emirates (UAE), Jordan, Argentina, Egypt and Peru, said Liu Jinzhen, the company’s Chairman. Currently, there are around 60,000 volunteers, as people from more than 125 nations joined the vaccine trials, he said.

According to an October 19 document from the World Health Organization (WHO), there are 44 Covid-19 candidate vaccines in clinical evaluation, among which 10 have reached the final stage of testing. China currently has 13 vaccine candidates in clinical trials, and among them three inactivated vaccines and one adenovirus vector vaccine are in phase three trials overseas, according to the Ministry of Science and Technology. Dozens of countries have already contacted CNBG to express interest in buying the vaccines once they have received official approval, according to Liu. Both vaccines have already been approved for emergency use in China in high-risk groups, such as frontline medical personnel, border staff, and people traveling overseas to work.

CNBG has completed building high biosafety production bases with a capacity that will exceed one billion doses next year to meet widespread demand for vaccination. Shanghai Geneodx Biotech Co, an affiliate of CNBG, is also one of the first three companies in China to develop coronavirus test kits, and CNBG is the first in China to develop convalescent plasma treatment for Covid-19 patients. Sinopharm ranked 169th on the Fortune Global 500 last year, and fourth among pharmaceutical companies, the China Daily reports.

After four days of nucleic acid testing of 4.7 million people in Kashgar prefecture in Xinjiang 61 new infections were discovered, bringing the total to 273 – 54 confirmed and 219 asymptomatic cases. Still, the risk that the virus would spread was small, epidemiologists said. Kashgar city remains open and outbound tourists are allowed to leave with a negative nucleic acid report and only the four most affected villages were labeled as high-risk areas. Epidemiologists are still looking for the source of the infection. Most infections are concentrated in Shufu county, but some were also detected in neighboring Akto county.

Despite sporadic outbreaks, a second wave of Covid-19 infections is not likely to happen in China thanks to forceful prevention and control, according to China’s leading respiratory disease expert Zhong Nanshan. Although the pandemic may worsen in most countries in the northern hemisphere, there is little possibility for the coronavirus to hit hard again in China, he added.

China has issued a draft regulation on compulsory insurance for Chinese vaccine manufacturers, saying it will better protect the legal rights of vaccine recipients and strengthen oversight of the industry. The draft regulation, released by the National Medical Products Administration for a month of public consultation, includes mandatory liability insurance for all licensed vaccine suppliers on the Chinese mainland to ensure they can provide compensation for recipients injured or killed by substandard vaccines. It mandates the establishment of a nationwide minimum liability limit, with at least CNY500,000 in compensation for a death and indemnities for injuries. “The overall safety and quality of domestic vaccines is well guaranteed. But vaccine products, from China or overseas, always carry inevitable risks, so devising an adequate compensation mechanism in advance is necessary,” said Du Yifang, Law Professor at Fudan University in Shanghai. China’s Drug Administration Law, which also applies to vaccines, already stipulates that people harmed by substandard drugs are entitled to compensation.

The coronavirus can pass from objects to humans, and exist in cold chain conditions for a long time, the Qingdao government in Shandong province announced, as it revealed how the virus spread from imported frozen food products in the latest outbreak in the city. The discovery was made public by Luan Xin, Deputy Mayor of Qingdao. China Customs told the Global Times they have been upgrading spot checks of imported goods, with emphasis on imported cold chain products, starting in September, even before Qingdao’s announcement that it discovered “object-to-human” virus passage. The Chinese Center for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) announced that it had detected and isolated living coronavirus in a positive sample from the outer packaging of imported frozen cod.

It was the first time the presence of the virus has been confirmed in the cold chain transport outside the laboratory and the virus can survive in cold chain conditions across borders. Wholesalers who purchase imported cold chain products have to report to local authorities 24 hours before the food arrives, said Chen Wansheng, a Qingdao official. Fan Xubing, a senior seafood industry analyst, told the Global Times that he does not think it is necessary to check every imported product, since the costs would be too high. “Under normal circumstances, the proportion of Customs spot checks will be 1%. But since sampling is random, no one can cheat on it,” said Fan. “The scale of frozen fish and meat imports is too large to completely cut off, and Customs authorities are strengthening spot checks on cold chain items to almost all containers,” a Customs officer told the Global Times. According to the Shanghai Daily, Qingdao Customs will conduct nucleic acid testing on all imported cold chain products. A Beijing Customs source said that the situation has put pressure on their work, and that Beijing has already suspended some cold chain related imports.

Meanwhile, 164 asymptomatic cases were reported in Kashgar prefecture in Xinjiang. They are all connected to a clothing factory where the parents of the first asymptomatic patient work. The 17-year old woman did not leave Shufu county in the past year and did not have contact with a known virus carrier. Chinese epidemiologists are now looking for the source of the infection, but warn that there could be a community outbreak and cases might be confirmed in the coming days. A Level-1 emergency response has been activated and all close contacts of the infected persons have been isolated for medical observation and testing. All 4.7 million people in the prefecture will be tested in three days time. The outbreak marks the Chinese mainland’s first local infection since October 14, when one was detected in Qingdao. Xinjiang was the site of a local cluster in August, but no new cases had been found in the region since August 15.

Concerning vaccine development, Chinese authorities refuted Western media reports that China has rolled out experimental Covid-19 vaccines to the general public. They are still only used for emergency purposes to vaccinate Chinese personnel traveling to high-risk areas abroad. This emergency use has been undertaken in line with relevant laws and regulations in China with the support of the World Health Organization (WHO), Zheng Zhongwei, an official from the National Health Commission (NHC) in charge of technology development, told a press conference. All those who have received the vaccination under the emergency plan have shown no severe adverse reactions, Zheng added. Zhejiang was the first province in China to announce that it will make Covid-19 vaccinations available to the public, but vaccinations have not started yet. “The vaccination is reservation-based, and it only covers key groups of people. Ordinary people have no access to the vaccines yet,” an official from the Yiwu Center for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) in Zhejiang province told the Global Times. Key groups of people covered by vaccines for emergency use include medics, workers involved in anti-epidemic prevention and control work, border control staff, and those who ensure city operations and management, according to the Yiwu city government. China has 13 vaccine candidates in clinical trials, including four in phase-3 trials. Around 60,000 volunteers have been inoculated with one of the four advanced vaccine candidates. Initial indications are that the vaccines are safe. China is expected to produce up to 610 million doses of Covid-19 vaccines by the end of this year, Zheng Zhongwei, head of China’s coronavirus vaccine development task force said, the Shanghai Daily reports. “Manufacturing conditions are mature, and the vaccines are ready. We’ll probably see them available to the public as soon as next month, or if not, by the end of this year,” a Beijing-based immunological expert who requested anonymity told the Global Times.

China has joined the Covid-19 Vaccines Global Access Facility, honoring its commitment to turn Covid-19 vaccines into a global public good. China signed an agreement with the Global Alliance for Vaccines and Immunization on its participation in the COVAX facility on October 8. “Even when China is leading the world with several vaccines in advanced stages of R&D and with ample production capacity, it still decided to join COVAX,” Foreign Ministry Spokeswoman Hua Chunying said. “We are taking this concrete step to ensure equitable distribution of vaccines, especially to developing countries, and hope other capable countries will also join and support COVAX,” she said. China will strengthen vaccine cooperation with other countries through the COVAX network, she added. With the Covid-19 pandemic still posing a severe threat to all countries, Hua stated that China will continue to work together with COVAX partners and contribute its share to the global fight against the pandemic to safeguard the safety and health of everyone.

COVAX is led by the World Health Organization (WHO) and two other groups: GAVI, which was founded 20 years ago as the Global Alliance for Vaccines and Immunization to make vaccines more available, and CEPI, the Coalition for Epidemic Preparedness Innovations, which helps finance and coordinate new vaccine development. COVAX aims to speed up the development and manufacture of Covid-19 vaccines and to guarantee fair and equitable access. It aims to have 2 billion doses available by the end of 2021. All participating countries and regions, regardless of income levels, will have equal access to a portfolio of vaccines once available. The facility is designed so that richer countries agree to buy potential vaccines and help finance access for poorer ones. China’s participation in COVAX represents a new move to strengthen international cooperation to fight the pandemic, said Su Xiaohui, Deputy Director of the Department for International and Strategic Studies at the China Institute of International Studies. COVAX helps ensure the ability to pay does not become a barrier to accessing Covid-19 vaccines, Su said, and China’s involvement will help developing economies benefit from the global vaccine initiative and have equal access to safe and effective vaccines. More than 160 countries and regions have joined the initiative, while the U.S. announced in September it would not participate in global coronavirus vaccine efforts.

China has four of the world’s nine vaccines in the third phase of clinical trials, typically the last step before regulatory approval. Two are developed by the China National Pharmaceutical Group, and the remaining two are from United States-listed Sinovac Biotech and Hong Kong-listed CanSino Biologics, the China Daily reports.

The Global Times adds that COVAX is one of the three pillars of the Access to Covid-19 Tools (ACT) Accelerator, which was launched in April by several global organizations including the WHO, Gavi and the Coalition for Epidemic Preparedness Innovations in response to the Covid-19 pandemic. As of September 21, 156 countries and regions had agreed to join the Covid-19 vaccine allocation plan, but the U.S. is not among them. China was also not among the first 156 countries to have announced their participation because the country was still in communication about some details, according to analysts. “The COVAX facility is especially important to developing countries as it ensures equal access to Covid-19 vaccines for both developed and developing countries,” Qiu Dongxu, Senior Vice President and Co-Founder of CanSino Biologics, said. The company targets a yearly output of 200 million to 300 million doses. A recombinant Covid-19 vaccine candidate co-developed by CanSino and a team led by Chinese military expert Chen Wei is currently undergoing Phase-III clinical trials in Pakistan and Russia, and primary results of the trials are expected in early 2021.

After 57 days of reporting no locally-transmitted Covid-19 cases, China reported a small outbreak in the city of Qingdao in Shandong province, identifying 6 locally-transmitted and 6 asymptomatic cases, all linked to the Qingdao Chest Hospital. Close contacts of the cases all tested negative and the city government decided to test all 9 million residents of the city within five days. Although 4.5 million tourists visited Qingdao during the National Day holiday from October 1 to 8, authorities estimate that the risk of people in other cities becoming infected remained small.