China has mobilised its army and fast-tracked tests in the global race to find a coronavirus vaccine, but its labs also have an image tarnished by past health scandals to overcome.
China has authorised fast-track procedures, allowing preclinical phases -- such as animal tests and other studies -- to be conducted at the same time instead of one after the other. "Many organisations globally are conducting adaptive trials that allow for rapid transition from phase one to two studies," said Jackson, whose organisation funds research into vaccines.One pharmaceutical company, Sinopharm, said its vaccine could be ready for the public at the end of the year or early 2021.
One of the biggest scandals involved Changchun Changsheng Biotechnology, which was fined a record $1.3 billion in 2018 after it fabricated records for a rabies vaccine for humans.