Gavi to purchase COVID-19 vaccine candidates from Sinopharm, Sinovac

With a pair of new advance purchase agreements arranged this week, Gavi, the Vaccine Alliance, intends to add two inactivated virus vaccines for COVID-19 to its stores for COVAX — one from Sinopharm and one from Sinovac.

Sinopharm’s offering is BBIBP-CorV, which will become available this month and flourish the COVAX Facility with 60 million doses through October. Another 60 million doses will be made available to COVAX for purchase in Q4 20021, followed by an additional 50 million in the first half of 2022 as well, putting a total of 170 million doses up for grabs by self-financing COVAX participants as well as those supported by the Gavi COVAX Advance Market Commitment.

Meanwhile, Sinovac will be simultaneously providing 50 million doses of CoronaVac from July through September 2021. Under contract terms, Gavi will also be granted the option to purchase another 150 million doses in the fourth quarter of the year, followed by an additional 180 million in the first half of 2022. All of these would, like BBIBP-CorV, go to the COVAX facility and further support participants with a total of 380 million potential doses of vaccine.

“I welcome today’s agreements with Sinopharm and Sinovac, which will make doses immediately available to COVAX participants,” Dr. Seth Berkley, CEO of Gavi, said. “This is yet another example of Gavi’s active portfolio management strategy, ensuring the Facility has options in the face of constraints such as supply delays. Thanks to this deal, and because these vaccines have already received WHO Emergency Use Listing, we can move to start supplying doses to countries immediately.”

In all, the arrangements make 110 doses rapidly available to the COVAX Facility to help shore up supply gaps. Both the Sinopharm and Sinovac vaccines have been granted World Health Organization Emergency Use Listing.