JAKARTA (Reuters) – A COVID-19 vaccine produced by Sinovac Biotech is considered halal, or permissible by Islam, the Indonesian Ulema Council said on Friday, days before the country started its Chinese vaccine inoculation program.
Indonesia, the largest Muslim-majority country in the world, has 3 million doses of CoronaVac and plans to use it when it starts its vaccination program on Wednesday, with President Joko Widodo scheduled to receive the first injection.
Asrorun Niam Sholeh, of the council’s fatwa committee, said at a news conference that Sinovac’s CoronaVac was “sacred and halal”, although authorization for its use still depends on the Indonesian food and medicine agency (BPOM).
“This may be the information that can calm people, especially Muslims,” said Niam.
Indonesia is battling the worst COVID-19 epidemic in Southeast Asia and officials are counting on a vaccine to help ease the economic and health crises that are plaguing the country.
It confirmed a record daily increase in COVID-19 cases for the third consecutive day on Friday, reporting more than 10,000 daily infections for the first time and exceeding the 800,000 case mark, among the highest number in Asia.
He reported 10,617 new infections on Friday, bringing the total number of cases to 808,340. He recorded 23,753 deaths.
The BPOM regulator said it is hopeful that approval of emergency use for CoronaVac, which depends on the results of vaccine tests in Indonesia, will be issued before Wednesday.
CoronaVac was 78% effective in a Brazilian trial at an advanced stage, with no serious cases of COVID-19, the researchers said on Thursday.
(Reporting by Stanley Widianto and Agustinus Beo Da Costa; Editing by Martin Petty)