Uzbekistan plans to launch the production of a vaccine against COVID-19 before the year-end, the Director of the Agency for the Development of the Pharmaceutical Industry under the Ministry of Health Sardor Qoriev said within the framework of the business program of the international industrial exhibition INNOPROM.
He recalled that the Nov. 25, 2020 presidential decree provides for the setting up of a high-end vaccine production site and a testing laboratory in Uzbekistan.
“Instructions have been given to create an infrastructure where Uzbekistan can supply itself with the necessary vaccines, including the coronavirus vaccine,” he said.
According to him, the Pharmaceutical Industry Development Agency, together with the Tashkent Medical Academy and other partners, is working in this direction. New production facilities are being designed.
“By the year-end, our production site will be ready. The Ministry of Innovative Development and our scientists are developing a new local vaccine against COVID-19,” he added.
Sardor Kariev said that the parties are still discussing the details of the project.
“The production of vaccines is a technologically very complex process. We made a proposal to the Russian side. There are several production sites in Uzbekistan that have the capacity to produce any modern type of vaccine. But the process is very long-term,” he said.
He noted that the vaccine production unit project provides for the transfer of technologies.
“Despite the fact that we have a production base, it should be slightly modernized and adjusted for new technological processes. In this regard, we are holding negotiations, experts are coming, looking at production sites, discuss issues of technology transfer,” he concluded.
