The technological advance in the development of vaccines in Cuba surprised the international press, with a global economic crisis and the worrying situation aggravated by the sanctions on the island, it was not possible to anticipate the “biotechnology monster”, said by Gmail Reed, editor of MEDICC Review.
The Abdala vaccine, produced by Cuba’s Center for Genetic Engineering and Biotechnology (CIGB), represents an achievement for the government. Eight of the 12 administered in childhood have been manufactured and the same, in North America, South America, Europe, Asia, Africa and the Caribbean.
Which countries have Cuban vaccines against covid-19 reached?
Although the development of assets such as this biological is considered a war between pharmaceutical companies. The first to acquire the scientific advance would be the allies of the Cuban government.
Vietnam. With the purchase of 10 million doses of Abdala by this Asian country, the possibility of certification and recommendation of the vaccine by the World Health Organization (WHO) loomed, which has not happened, despite having carried out the procedure .
The Vietnamese government issued resolution 109/NQ-CP, which authorized the purchase of the biological and the Ministry of Health itself indicated that it was a safe, quality and effective treatment.
Meanwhile, in November 2021 it was reported that more than a million and a half doses of Abdala were delivered to Venezuela. In the results of the Cuban scientists, it showed effectiveness of 92.28 percent and the combination of two doses of Soberana 02 with a third of Soberana Plus reached 91.2 percent.
Venezuela began to vaccinate its population with Abdala when it was still a candidate and had not been recognized by the Cuban regulatory agency (Cecmed) as an immunogen, that is, Venezuela was also the scene of massive tests by scientists to establish efficacy.
Meanwhile, Nicaragua is not far behind in the use of Soberana and Abdala, with the issuance of an emergency use certificate, the country received one million 200 thousand doses, which would be applied to children and adolescents from two to 17 years.
In Iran, in May 2022, the inauguration of the PastoCorona production plant was announced, which would receive a technology transfer from Soberana02. In this way, Iran became the first in the world to produce one of the Cuban vaccines against covid-19 and would market the Sovereign 02 of the Finlay Institute of Vaccines, as PastuCovac, in that Persian country.
The president of the Cuban company BioCubaFarma, Eduardo Martínez, said that the inauguration of the plant in Iran consolidated the scientific collaboration and the international insertion of the company in question.
Within the Caribbean community, the first country to receive the Cuban biological was Saint Vincent and the Grenadines, which barely had 30 percent of the population immunized with one dose and 23 percent with a complete regimen. Abdala joined Sputnik, AstraZeneca and Pfizer.
Before receiving the vaccine, Ralph Gonsalves, Prime Minister of that nation, expressed that he wanted to apply the Abdala and added: “God and the Cuban vaccine will save us from covid-19.”
A donation of 240,000 doses left for Syria at the beginning of 2022. “The vaccines developed by Cuban science, the first in Latin America, constitute a modest contribution to confronting the pandemic worldwide that fills us with satisfaction to be able to share with the brother Syrian people”, expressed the vice minister of Foreign Trade of the island, Ana Teresita González.
In Mexico, Abdala joined the National Vaccination Strategy in 2022, with the approval of the Federal Commission for the Protection of Health Risks (Cofepris). The first batch, with more than 4 million, arrived at the end of November and a month later the Biological and Reactive Laboratories of Mexico (Birmex) announced a second batch with 4.9 million.
Faced with a call for a boycott by opposition groups, the Mexican doctor Mauricio Rodríguez, from the University Commission for attention to the coronavirus emergency (UNAM), affirms: “Anyone who puts Mexico and Cuba on a scale and competes in Regarding vaccines, Mexico loses because Cuba has been producing its own vaccines for more than 30 years and exporting them to UNICEF, PAHO and many other countries”.
Abdala has traveled to six nations: Vietnam, Saint Vincent and the Grenadines, Nicaragua, Venezuela, Syria, and Mexico. Meanwhile, Yury Valdés Balbín, deputy director of the Finlay Vaccine Institute, points out that Soberana 02 and Soberana Plus have reached Iran, Venezuela, Nicaragua, Belarus, Syria and the Sahrawi Arab Democratic Republic.
There is no greater proof of the effectiveness of Cuban vaccines than the current numbers of infections and deaths from covid-19 on the island: in 2023, as of February 16, there were only 517 infections with an average of 11.2 per day and no one had died of covid-19, while epidemic peaks continue to take place in various countries around the world.
* Journalist
