Netherlands: Dutch Court of Justice Directs Government to Lift COVID-19 Curfew Immediately yahoo.com - get the latest breaking news, showbiz & celebrity photos, sport news & rumours, viral videos and top stories from yahoo.com Daily Mail and Mail on Sunday newspapers.
Vaccine. Representational Image (Photo Credits: IANS)
Jakarta, December 21: In October, Indonesian diplomats and Muslim clerics stepped off a plane in China. While the diplomats were there to finalise deals to ensure millions of doses reached Indonesian citizens, the clerics had a much different concern: Whether the COVID-19 vaccine was permissible for use under Islamic law.
As companies race to develop a COVID-19 vaccine and countries scramble to secure doses, questions about the use of pork products banned by some religious groups has raised concerns about the possibility of disrupted immunisation campaigns.
Pork-derived gelatin has been widely used as a stabilizer to ensure vaccines remain safe and effective during storage and transport. Some companies have worked for years to develop pork-free vaccines: Swiss pharmaceutical company Novartis has produced a pork-free meningitis vaccine, while Saudi- and Malaysia-based AJ Pharma is currently working on one of their own.