Not All Sinovac Bulks Processed into Finished Vaccines: Bio Farma

TEMPO.CO, Jakarta - Indonesia had just received its sixth import of Sinovac Covid-19 vaccine bulks, or in the form of raw materials, on Thursday, March 25. It will later be processed as a readily-used vaccine by state-pharmaceutical firm Bio Farma. 

Spokesperson for the national vaccination program at Bio Farma, Bambang Heriyanto, said that not all of the 53.5 million vaccine bulks would be able to be processed. 

“It will not all be turned into 53.5 million readily-available vaccines. There are processes, such as overfill, wastage. From the total amount, it is predicted to create 43 million doses,” said the spokesperson in a virtual press conference on Thursday, March 25. 

According to Bambang, Bio Farma has been working hard and 'firing on all cylinders' since the arrival of the first Sinovac vaccines earlier this year in January and has continued producing the vaccines to this day. He said there are at least 24 million doses of Sinovac vaccines the firm produced today.

“We have distributed nearly 17 million from 24 million that were produced. The 17 million had definitely obtained the lot release from the Food and Drugs Monitoring Agency (BPOM),” said Bambang. 

On another note, President Joko “Jokowi” Widodo openly announced that his goal is to complete the vaccination process by the end of this year with 185 million Indonesians as vaccine recipients to reach the intended herd immunity against Covid-19. 

Read: 16 Million Sinovac Vaccines Material Arrives in Indonesia

EGI ADYATAMA