Coronavirus: China to ensure global cooperation in vaccine trials

The science and technology minister said that China will ensure international cooperation in clinical vaccine trials of Covid-19 in the future.

China is putting efforts to develop a vaccine for coronavirus. According to the World Health Organization, Chinese researchers are organizing five separate clinical trials on humans.

Chinese president Xi Jinping promised at the World Health Assembly, the WHO’s governing body, that China will develop a vaccine that will become a “global public good” once they are ready for application. China will ensure the vaccine’s accessibility and affordability in developing countries.

Science and Technology Minister Wang Zhigang said in a news conference that developing “a vaccine is still the fundamental strategy in our effort to overcome the new coronavirus,”

But he also mentioned that developing a vaccine takes time and is hard. “The rigor of vaccine development has been compared by some scientists to a dance involving precise steps and rehearsals,”

The government has insisted the global cooperation, It said in a white paper unveiled by the State Council Information Office at the news conference that the international community should not politicize the virus.

According to the white paper, The head of the Chinese Center for Disease Control and Prevention had briefed the US by phone about coronavirus as early as January 4. The white paper mentioned that the medical cost of all the coronavirus patients in China totaled 1.35 billion yuan ($191 million) till the end of May.