The American pharmaceutical company Johnson & Johnson may test its vaccine against COVID-19 in Ukraine, according to Ukrainian Deputy Health Minister Viktor Lyashko.
“There is a problem in Ukraine: Vaccines are rarely tested in our country,” Lyashko said in an interview with the Segodnya news site on Oct. 2. “This is due to the fact that we have lost our (domestic) industry for producing immunobiological drugs.”
Despite Ukraine’s inclusion in Johnson & Johnson’s list of possible candidates for vaccine testing in the last stage of trials, such trials are unlikely to happen anytime soon without the consent of Ukraine’s State Expert Center.
Before conducting the study, the center must evaluate the project and approve it. Lyashko stated that no clinical study of immunobiological drugs in Ukraine has been registered so far.
At the same time, Ukraine is developing its own COVID-19 vaccine and has completed the stage of preclinical trials on animals and human cells. However, there are three more stages of clinical trials yet to come, and, if produced, this vaccine will likely come later than ones in the United States, the United Kingdom, China or Russia.
Read also: Developers say Ukraine-made COVID-19 vaccine candidate showed promise in animal trials.
EXCLUSIVE
American pharmaceutical company may conduct COVID-19 vaccine testing in Ukraine
Medical workers wearing protective gear talk near the entrance to the infectious disease ward of Kyiv's Oleksandrivska Clinical Hospital on Oct. 12, 2020.
