The COVID-19 vaccine developed by British pharmaceutical firm AstraZeneca has been authorized for emergency use in the Philippines, the Food and Drug Administration said Thursday.
AstraZeneca's COVID-19 vaccines are projected to cost P610 for two doses, among the cheapest based on available pricing. The vaccine, developed with the Univeristy of Oxford is the second to secure emergency use authorization in the Philippines, Director-General Eric Domingo of the FDA said.
"It is decided that all conditions for an EUA are present and that the benefit of using the vaccine outweighs the known and potential risks," Domingo said.
Granting an EUA to a vaccine would expedite its availability to the people who need it the most. In the case of the COVID-19 pandemic, the Philippine government is rushing to make vaccines available to the most vulnerable to the virus: medical frontliners, and the elderly.
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AstraZeneca earlier said that its COVID-19 vaccine, which was developed with the University of Oxford has shown "an average efficacy of 70%" in trials. The results ranged between 62% and 90% efficacy depending on the vaccine dosage.
This is lower compared with the efficacy of coronavirus vaccines trialed by rivals Pfizer/BioNTech and Moderna which have come in at around 95%, but higher than China's Sinovac which has come in at 50.4% in the latest trial.
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The Philippines has ordered some 17.7 million doses of AstraZeneca's COVID-19 vaccines.
