The World Health Organization (WHO) on 7 May approved the COVID-19 vaccine developed by China's Sinopharm for emergency use.

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The move paves the way for the Sinopharm vaccine to be rolled out globally. "This afternoon, the WHO gave emergency use listing to Sinopharm, Beijing's COVID-19 vaccine, making it the sixth vaccine to receive WHO validation for safety, efficacy and quality", WHO Director-General Tedros Ghebreyesus said during a webinar on COVID-19. The Sinopharm vaccine is produced by Beijing Bio-Institute of Biological Products Co Ltd, a subsidiary of China National Biotec Group. "The Sinopharm product is an inactivated vaccine called SARS-CoV-2 Vaccine (Vero Cell). Its easy storage requirements make it highly suitable for low-resource settings", said the WHO.

The Sinopharm vaccine is already in use in 42 countries around the world. Earlier this week, the European Medicine Agency (EMA) started a rolling review of the second Chinese COVID-19 vaccine called Sinovac, Xinhua news agency reported. "The vaccine triggers the production of antibodies that target SARS-CoV-2, the virus that causes COVID-19, and may help protect against the disease", said the EMA. The WHO has given emergency use for vaccines made by Pfizer-BioNTech, Moderna, Johnson and Johnson and the AstraZeneca jab (being produced in India as Covishield and South Korea).