Covid Vaccine: Nepali firm likely to buy 2m shots of BANCOVID

Nepalese drugmaker Anmol Healthcare Ltd might buy two million shots of BANCOVID, the vaccine candidate being developed by Bangladesh's Globe Biotech Ltd, officials said.

The Nepalese company has sent a "letter of intent" to Globe on Wednesday, said a spokesperson of the company.

Nepalese Ambassador to Bangladesh Dr Banshidhar Mishra visited a laboratory of the company in the capital yesterday.

The Nepal government is also interested in procuring the potential vaccine once the clinical trials are complete, the ambassador said at the facility.

"We wrote to Anmol stating that we will supply the vaccine once it passes the trials," Dr Mohammad Mohiuddin, manager (quality and regulatory operations) at Globe, told The Daily Star.

Nepal will buy BANCOVID "for sure" after its successful clinical trials, the ambassador told journalists at the Globe facility.

"We anticipate that this vaccine will be cheaper [for Nepal]. Another reason is the dominant virus strain in South Asia, which is causing the infections, is the same in Bangladesh and Nepal… So this vaccine will be more effective," Banshidhar said, adding that his government is exploring other sources of vaccine as well.

Globe Chairman Harunur Rashid said different foreign governments and corporations have shown interest in BANCOVID.

"Orders of some 20 million doses are in the pipeline," Harunur said.

Globe Biotech on July 2 announced that it had been developing a Covid-19 vaccine and "had successfully completed the preliminary animal trials".

On October 5, the company announced it had received "very promising" results from the pre-clinical trials on rabbits and mice and were ready for clinical trials.

On October 15, three Covid-19 vaccine candidates, including BANCOVID, were included in the draft landscape of the World Health Organisation (WHO).

The International Centre for Diarrhoeal Disease Research, Bangladesh (icddr,b) is going to administer human trials.

A memorandum of understanding was signed between the icddr,b and the Globe on October 15.