Indonesia in talks with WHO to become global vaccine hub: minister

Genexine

16/09/2021 02:30

By Tom Allard and Kate Lamb
    JAKARTA, Sept 16 (Reuters) - Indonesia is in talks with the
World Health Organization (WHO) as well as six drug companies to
become a global hub for manufacturing vaccines, its health
minister told Reuters.
    Detailing the ambitious strategy for the first time, Budi
Gunadi Sadikin said in an interview that Indonesia would
kickstart the initiative by prioritising purchases of COVID-19
vaccines from companies that shared technology and set up
facilities in Indonesia. 
    "We are working with the WHO to be one of the global
manufacturing hubs for mRNA," he said, adding he had directly
lobbied WHO Director-General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus on a
trip earlier this month to Europe.
    "The WHO has pointed to South Africa as the
first location, and I said that logically Indonesia should be
the second."
    The new "technology transfer hubs" are part of a WHO
strategy to more widely distribute vaccine production globally
and build capacity in developing countries to make new
generation vaccines like Moderna  MRNA.O  and Pfizer's  PFE.N 
nucleic acid-based mRNA jabs which can be quickly adapted to
handle new virus variants.
    Efforts to develop a base for COVID-19 vaccine production in
South Africa will focus on trying to replicate Moderna's shot,
but a lack of progress in talks with the U.S. company mean the
project will take time, a senior WHO official told Reuters.
 urn:newsml:reuters.com:*:nL8N2QB264
    Budi said Indonesia was keen to build expertise in mRNA
vaccines, as well as viral vector shots such as those produced
by AstraZeneca  AZN.L .
    A WHO spokesperson said Indonesia was one of 25 low and
middle income countries to express interest in hosting a vaccine
hub but declined to say if it was a leading candidate.
    Budi said Indonesia was well-placed to export vaccines
around the world, especially as it is the world's most populous
Muslim-majority country and could guarantee that its jabs were
halal, or permissible according to Islam.
    Indonesia has grappled with one of the most severe outbreaks
of COVID-19 in Asia and has recorded more than 4.1 million
infections and 139,000 deaths, although public health experts
say the true figures are likely several times higher.
    Indonesia's rate of infections and deaths has declined
sharply in recent weeks but, with only 25 per cent of its target
population of 208 million people fully inoculated against
COVID-19, it still has a major vaccination effort ahead,
especially as it likely will have to provide third booster
shots.
    Budi said Indonesian pharmaceutical companies are in
discussions with vaccine manufacturers and developers Anhui,
Walvax  300142.SZ , Sinovac  SVA.O , Genexine  095700.KQ ,
Arcturus Therapeutics and Novavax  NVAX.O . The talks range from
basic "fill and finish" to upstream production and research and
development, he added.
    "We open the same opportunities also to AstraZeneca. We are
also open to the existing partner Pfizer," he said. "We are open
to anyone."
    Bambang Heriyanto, corporate secretary of Bio Farma,
Indonesia's largest state-owned drug company, confirmed the
talks were on and the first step was to collaborate on the
transfer of technology. It would take two or three years to
build a fully operational production facility, he said.
    Budi said Indonesia would use its leadership of the G-20
group of countries starting in December to promote global health
security and prepare for the next pandemic after the
coronavirus, also known as SARS-CoV-2.
    "No one can guarantee that SARS-CoV-3 and 4 will not come."

 (Reporting by Tom Allard in Jakarta and Kate Lamb in Sydney;
Additional reporting by Agustinus Beo Da Costa in Jakarta;
Editing by Raju Gopalakrishnan)
 ((Kate.Lamb@thomsonreuters.com;))