More Data Needed To Assess Sinovac Jabs: Experts

Medical experts on Wednesday said more data is needed to evaluate the efficacy of the coronavirus vaccine produced by mainland company Sinovac, in view of media reports that the jabs were found to be 50 percent effective during trials in Brazil.

Infectious disease specialist Joseph Tsang from Hong Kong Medical Association said the data released so far was preliminary and incomplete, and should be interpreted carefully.

"According to the media, the 50.4 per cent efficacy rate includes patients with mild symptoms and those asymptomatic carriers. So whether the asymptomatic carriers bring down the figures, we don't know at this point. So we have to get more data from Sinovac in order to interpret as a whole," he said.

Tsang said he also hoped to see more data collected from other countries which have used Sinovac vaccines, rather than just Brazil.

A specialist in respiratory medicine, Dr Leung Chi-chiu, said the figures available currently cannot be used to make apple-to-apple comparisons between coronavirus vaccines produced by different companies.

"We are not certain what these figures are talking about. There are multiple levels of efficacy. We can talk about efficacy against all infections. We can talk about efficacy against symptomatic infections. We can talk about efficacy against serious infections. All these have different meanings," he said.

"We need to look at the full data set before we can have a better guess of the actual situation and compare the efficacy between different vaccines," Leung said.

The Secretary for the Civil Service, Patrick Nip, meanwhile, said an expert panel appointed by the government would meet this week and review relevant clinical data.

Nip, who is one of the officials in charge of the vaccination programme to be rolled out in Hong Kong, said the panel would give clear advice on the matter later.

It is expected that Hong Kong people will start receiving coronavirus vaccinations in mid-February, with jabs produced by Sinovac being the first to arrive in the city.