Branding for the vaccination program on the clothes of a team outside a community vaccination center administering the BioNTech Covid-19 vaccine imported by Fosun Pharma in Hong Kong, China, on Wednesday, March 17, 2021
Chan Long Hei | Bloomberg via Getty Images
Shares in China’s Shanghai Fosun Pharmaceutical Group fell after Hong Kong and Macau announced on Wednesday that they were suspending vaccines at BioNTech Covid.
Fosun Pharma, BioNTech’s partner in the development and distribution of the Comirnaty Covid-19 vaccine in Greater China, notified cities of a packaging failure in batch 210102 of the vaccine.
Hong Kong and Macau reported that they are suspending German-made vaccines as a precautionary measure.
The cities said BioNTech and Fosun Pharma are investigating the cause of the defect in the bottle cap, adding that there is currently no reason to doubt the vaccine’s safety.
Macau said that all messenger RNA, or mRNA, vaccines belong to the affected batch. Hong Kong said it would also temporarily suspend vaccination of lot 210104 until the investigation was completed.
Hong Kong-listed Fosun Pharma shares fell 4.83% on Wednesday afternoon in the city.
Hong Kong approved the BioNTech vaccine for emergency use in January, while Macau granted special import authorization for the vaccine in late February. Both territories received their first batch of shots in late February.
BioNTech’s mRNA-based vaccine has a demonstrated 95% efficacy in adults, according to data from its global phase 3 clinical trial. And real-world data showed “very strong” results from Pfizer-BioNTech’s two-dose Covid vaccine, even after just one injection.
The news comes as countries around the world rush to vaccinate their populations in the face of rising Covid cases in most regions.
Globally, more than 124 million infections have been reported and the number of deaths at Covid has exceeded 2.7 million, according to data compiled by Johns Hopkins University.