BRIEF—China buys 100 million doses of BioNTech/Pfizer vaccine

BioNTech and Shanghai Fosun Pharmaceutical have agreed to supply China with an initial 100 million doses of their BNT162 mRNA-based vaccine candidate against COVID-19.

Approved in several countries including the UK, USA and Canada, the deal with China is subject to the product’s approval from the country’s medicines regulator.

In March 2020, BioNTech and Fosun Pharma announced a strategic collaboration to work jointly on the vaccine, and a Phase II trial is ongoing in Jiangsu Province, China.

The trial commenced with the recruitment of 960 healthy participants, between 18 to 85 years old, and will be used to support a Biologic License Application (BLA) in the country.