Health authorities in Canada have approved the country’s first clinical trial for a Covid-19 vaccine, Prime Minister Justin Trudeau said.
“The National Research Council of Canada will be working with the manufacturers, so that if these vaccine trials are successful we can produce and distribute it here at home,” Trudeau told reporters on Saturday.
“This is encouraging news”, he added.
While Trudeau did not discuss where the possible vaccine was being developed, the National Research Council announced earlier this week that it would collaborate with CanSino Biologics Inc, a company based in China.
The company’s vaccine effort is backed and funded in part by the Chinese government.
As of Friday, there were at least 118 potential Covid-19 vaccines in the works around the world but only eight were in clinical trials, the World Health Organization said.
