Countries signal waning confidence in Chinese vaccine against Delta variant

New Delhi, July 14 (SocialNews.XYZ) Thailand and Indonesia say they will give a booster shot to healthcare workers who received Sinovac, Wall Street Journal reported.

Thailand became the latest country to signal waning confidence in a Chinese vaccine against the highly contagious Delta variant, saying it would offer booster shots of Western doses to healthcare workers.

Healthcare workers who received two doses of the vaccine developed by Sinovac Biotech Ltd would be given a third shot made by either Pfizer Inc or BioNTech SE or AstraZeneca PLC, Thailand's health ministry said. Those who had only one dose would receive AstraZeneca as their second, the report said.

The decision to mix the vaccines makes Thailand the latest country to show reservations about whether Chinese vaccines work well enough to protect medical workers against the Delta variant, which was first detected in India and is thought to be far more contagious than earlier versions of the virus. The strain has spread to at least 98 countries, WSJ said.

Indonesia said last week that it would offer medical workers a booster shot from Moderna Inc. Around 90 per cent of the country's medical staff have received two doses of the Sinovac vaccine, but hundreds have fallen ill from Covid-19, reducing medical manpower amid a surge of the virus, according to Indonesia's health ministry and doctors' groups, the report said.

Source: IANS