Scientists should bolster defense against COVID-19 strains, senior biomedical engineer says

The country's scientific community should continue its rigorous and intensive research on COVID-19, and bolster the nation's preparedness by developing vaccines and diagnostic kits against mutated strains of SARS-CoV-2, a senior biomedical engineer said during the second plenary meeting of the fourth session of the 13th National Committee of the Chinese People's Political Consultative Conference on Sunday.

"History and practices have told us that only by grasping core technologies with our own hands can we ensure socioeconomic development, long-term prosperity and the stability of the nation, and safeguard people's lives and health," said Chen Wei, an academic at the Chinese Academy of Engineering and the lead scientist who spearheaded China's single-dose adenovirus vector vaccine against COVID-19.

The vaccine, dubbed "Ad5-nCoV", uses a weakened common cold virus to introduce a section of the genetic material from the novel coronavirus into the human body, thus training its immune system to recognize the virus and fight it off.

With a single injection, the vaccine has an overall efficacy rate of 65.7 percent at preventing symptomatic cases and is 90.98 percent effective in preventing severe disease, according to interim analysis of phase three human trials.

Current data shows that a single dose should provide protection for six months. If an individual were to receive a booster shot after the six months period, it can increase the immune response 10 to 20 times, and the two-shot regime is estimated to provide protection for two years.

On March 16, Ad5-nCoV was the first vaccine candidate against COVID-19 in the world to enter human trials. It was later green-lighted for emergency use in the Chinese military and has now been approved for conditional market use in China.