Deal to co-produce Sinopharm vaccines in Bangladesh soon: foreign minister
Bangladesh will soon sign a memorandum of understanding (MoU) with China to co-produce Sinopharm Covid-19 vaccines in Bangladesh, said Foreign Minister Dr AK Abdul Momen today.
"The MoU will be signed among Bangladesh's health ministry, Incepta Pharmaceuticals Ltd and Chinese company Sinopharm," he told reporters after Chinese Ambassador to Dhaka Li Jiming made a courtesy call on him at the State Guesthouse Padma today.
"We have sent a draft MoU to the health ministry… under the deal, Incepta will get the vaccine in bulk from Sinopharm and then will do the bottling, labelling and finishing," Momen said.
"It should be done soon because even after starting the work, it will take two months for the pharmaceutical company to complete the necessary procedure, the minister added.
Currently, Bangladesh is importing Sinopharm vaccines from China under a commercial deal. To date, 70 lakh Sinopharm vaccines of the contracted 1.5 crore have arrived in the country.
China said Bangladesh need to order vaccines in advance if more are to be imported because there is a high demand of Sinopharm vaccines globally, Momen added.
Bangladesh has planned to vaccinate one crore people in a massive campaign next week.
Asked about the import of Sputnik V vaccine from Russia, Momen said, "The Covid-19 infection in Russia have risen severely and therefore, officials are not going to office which is delaying the MoU signing of Sputnik V import".
Bangladesh government had sent a proposal to the Russian government to purchase 10 million Sputnik V vaccines almost a month ago but Russia is yet to reply.
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