> China absolutely could have gotten mRNA vaccines. Hell, Hong Kong had them.

Hong Kong has 7 million people… 7 million != 1.3 billion.

Are you saying Hong Kong can't produce more vaccine than its own population? I mean, the US produced enough for 20x it's population.

Hong Kong imported the vaccines. The city was international enough that using a foreign (non-Chinese) vaccine wasn't a political statement that the Chinese vaccine wasn't as effective. The political calculus is different for China generally.

The plan was to manufacturer the vaccine in Asia for the Chinese market.

I agree that the politically, China didn't want to use Western vaccines.

BioNTech and Fosun Pharma are setting up a 50-50 joint venture to make and sell the COVID mRNA shot in China, with manufacturing capacity to produce up to 1 billion doses a year, Fosun said in a filing (PDF) to the Hong Kong Exchange on Sunday.

https://www.fiercepharma.com/manufacturing/biontech-fosun-ph...

Setting up… so you’re saying they don’t have access to it now… Which means they didn’t have access to it in January… Which was my point the entire time.

They always had access to it. Either through imports or manufacturing in Hong Kong.

They choose not to use it.

This just isn't true. There has never been enough global supply for China AND the rest of the world. If there was, why (as you stated) would they be setting up net-new manufacturing of it?

That, coupled with the fact that the Chinese population have resisted getting vaccinated meant that it was never a viable strategy to purchase billions of doses and open up. The only option they had was COVID-0 style strategies.

I dont know why youre so hung up on “not enough supply for China”. There is no binary option. They could have imported multiple vaccines (like Vietnam and many other countries did) and used what they imported.

They didnt.

Instead they used their home grown vaccine which had terrible efficacy.

Vaccinating 20% of your population is not helpful. You need to hit 50-80% else you shouldn’t do it.

Supply being one problem and uptake being the other. Meant China never had a proper “opening up” option presented.

I’m saying no one could produce enough supply for the whole world plus China. That capability is only just coming online nowish.

And yes HK couldn’t produce or purchase the billions of doses required to vaccinate the mainland. I’m saying that too

They dont need to produce enough for all of China. They could have imported 100M and used that.

They didnt.

It would have been pointless. 10% vaccinated would not have had a big enough impact rate of hospitalisation.

I think you don’t really understand the problem.

The FDA would be asking for submission if that vaccine was from Europe. There was a huge supply side problem in the US in the initial stages of the pandemic and any additional vaccines could have alleviated this issue.

The FDA doesn't "ask" for submission. The manufacturer initiates the review.

Don't be so pedantic. When people are dying and supply is low, "asking" for it is a valid move whether by the FDA or the president.

The fact that it wasn't done is deliberate from both sides.

That's not how it works. I should know - I've submitted things to the FDA.

If the Chinese vaccine manufacturers wanted an FDA review, they can pay a fee and get it.

It's not about the technicalities of submission. It's about whether or not there was political desire to "bend the knee" and ask for a vaccine. The answer is obviously no. Neither side will do it.