Two Chinese-produced vaccines prequalified by WHO

BEIJING -- Two Chinese-produced vaccines -- a bivalent Oral Poliomyelitis Vaccine (bOPV) and a hepatitis A vaccine (HAV) -- have received prequalification by the World Health Organization (WHO).

The move indicates that the WHO has given the vaccines its stamp of approval for the safety and efficacy, and United Nations procuring agencies may now source them.

"Prequalification of bOPV is very good news for the Global Polio Eradication Initiative," said Fabio Scano, the officer in charge of the WHO Representative Office in China. "Following the switch from trivalent OPV to bOPV in 2016, most countries are going to cure polio with the combination of inactivated polio vaccine and bOPV, and China will be a sufficient supplier of this essential vaccine."

The country now has four vaccines prequalified by the WHO.

"We are very pleased to see China's innovation and production capacity bring lifesaving vaccines to the world through the WHO prequalification program," said Scano.