China National Biotec Group (CNBG) said on Sunday that early human trials of its second Covid-19 vaccine candidate has shown promising results suggesting that it could be safe and effective, Reuters reported.

CNBG, an affiliate of the state-owned China National Pharmaceutical Group (Sinopharm) had developed units of two potential Covid-19 vaccine candidates.

The two shots developed by CNBG had previously been tested with 2,000 volunteers in phase I and II trials conducted in China. One of the vaccines had been declared safe while the data for the second shot was expected to be released on June 28, Bloomberg had reported.

The experimental vaccine candidate developed by the Chinese firm has induced high-level antibodies in participants in a Phase 1/2 clinical trial involving 1,120 healthy volunteers, the report said.

CNBG in a filing earlier this week had said that it had received approval to conduct the final phase of human trials for its first Covid-19 vaccine candidate to be declared safe with volunteers in the UAE. It will partner with Abu Dhabi-based artificial intelligence and cloud computing firm G42 for trials and local production of the vaccine, Bloomberg reported.

This makes it one of the first vaccines to reach the final stage of testing before entering the commercial market, as per reports.

China currently has eight different vaccine candidates in various phases of human trials, according to the Reuters report.

Currently, AstraZeneca’s vaccine candidate developed in partnership with the University of Oxford is a major front-runner in the vaccine race for the pandemic which has infected over 9.9 million people across the globe, according to the World Health Organization.

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