A medical staff opens a box of the Chinese Sinopharm Covid-19 vaccine.
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Robert Atanasovski / AFP
The World Health Organization on Friday approved Chinese vaccine Sinopharm for emergency use in coronavirus patients.
This is the first vaccine developed by a non-Western country to get the global health body’s backing. The WHO had previously only approved the vaccines made by Pfizer, AstraZeneca, Johnson & Johnson and Moderna.
A WHO emergency listing is a signal to national regulators that a product is safe and effective. It also allows the vaccine to be included in COVAX, the World Health Organization’s global initiative to promote equitable vaccine distribution around the world by supplying them to poorer nations.