Cuba Announces Domestic Covid-19 Vaccine within Six Months

RIO DE JANEIRO, BRAZIL – Cuba will be able to immunize its entire population against the coronavirus with its own vaccine in the first half of 2021, according to the director of the IFV (Finlay Institute of Vaccines), Vicente Vérez Bencomo.

The country is able “to immunize the Cuban population against the SARS-CoV-2 virus in the first half of 2021,” said Vérez yesterday to Granma official newspaper.

Vérez made the statement before Cuban President Miguel Díaz-Canel during a visit to the IFV, where two candidate vaccines against covid-19 are being developed: Soberana01 and Soberana02.

The “soberanas have made significant progress in the clinical trial: 01 is ending Phase 1, and 02 is entering Phase 2,” Vérez said.

He pointed out that the two vaccines proved to be reliable in terms of safety and immune response, but “the Soberana 02 in particular, due to its features, showed an early immune response (at 14 days), which allows to proceed to Phase 2 clinical trials more rapidly”.

The official explained that in January, approximately 1,000 volunteers will be vaccinated with the various formulas of the Soberana 02, “to later, after the required assessments and clearances, enter Phase 3” with the involvement of some 150,000 subjects in Havana.

Negotiations to develop the Soberana 02 Phase 3 clinical trials are also progressing in other countries due to the low incidence of Covid-19 in the Cuban population, he added.

The Center for Genetic Engineering and Biotechnology is also working on two other Covid-19 vaccine candidates, named Mambisa and Abdala.

Cuban scientists have experience in obtaining and manufacturing vaccines. The national vaccination program for all children consists of 11 vaccines against 13 diseases. Eight of them are produced in the island.

Although it is currently facing an increase in cases due to the opening of borders, Cuba, with 11.2 million inhabitants, has been keeping the spread of the disease under control, with a cumulative 11,434 cases and 143 deaths by Sunday, low figures compared to its neighbors in the region.