Originally posted by the Voice of America. Voice of America content is produced by the Voice of America, a United States federal government-sponsored entity, and is in the public domain. Beijing Pushing for Vaccine Passport for Those Inoculated With Chinese Vaccines Joyce Huang TAIPEI - After exporting COVID-19 vaccines to almost 70 countries, China is gearing up to push for its own vaccine passport to ease entry to foreigners and foreign residents of China inoculated withChina-made vaccines. Beijing hopes the vaccine passport will be an incentive for businesspeople,including Taiwanese citizenswho travel frequently to and from China,to get Beijing-approved jabs. But many eligible for the program worry aboutthe lowerefficacy ofSinopharm and [1]Sinovacvaccinescomparedwiththat of vaccinesmadeoutside China,andtheyfeel pressured to use Chinese vaccinestoobtain entry to China.'¯ The Sinovac vaccine's efficacy rate is slightly higher than 50%, whiletheSinopharm vaccine's efficacy rate is 79%, far lower than that of Moderna, Pfizer and eventheRussian-made Sputnikvaccine, all ofwhich are above 90%, according toaBloombergreportciting experimental data fromresearchers outside China. China launched full-scale registration of China-made vaccines for foreigners in Beijing and Shanghaiat the end of March.Similar provincial-level programs began in April for foreignersconcentrated in the cities ofShenzhen,Guangzhou,HangzhouandChongqing.'¯ A woman holds a small bottle labeled with a "Coronavirus COVID-19 Vaccine" sticker and a medical syringe in front of displayed China flag, Oct. 30, 2020. In addition, the Taiwan Affairs Office of the State Council announced on April 14 that Taiwanese citizenswho livein China will be allowed to register foravaccination at their places of residenceusingtheir residence permits or a certificate of Chinese health insurance coverage.'¯'¯ Before the current push, theChinese Ministry of Foreign Affairs hadannouncedas ofMarch 15thatfurther"visa facilitation"wouldbe provided to foreign nationalsinoculatedwith China-made vaccines.'¯However,Foreign Ministry spokesman ZhaoLijiansaid atthat day's[2]press briefing. that visitors to Chinawouldstillneedtohavenegative results from both nucleic acid tests and serology testsbefore boarding a flight to China. Afterentering China, the visitors would be requiredto checkin forweeks-longquarantineat a government-designated hotel at their own expense. Foreign vaccines Zhao also said that China is willing toundertakemutual recognition of vaccinationswith other countries. But he declined to comment on whether China would consider accepting and facilitating the WHO-approved Pfizer-BioNTech, AstraZeneca and Johnson&Johnson vaccines in the future.'¯Zhao did notmentionthe Moderna vaccine. Anticipatingthat the vaccine passport willlead tofurther relaxation of travel restrictions, Vincent Hsu, a Taiwanesecitizenwho does business in China, said that he and manyof his counterparts are open to gettingthe China-made vaccines.'¯'¯ Hsu told VOAMandarin,"Because we can get vaccine passports, even if the passportsdonotapplyto the whole world, at least we don't have to quarantine in China. I thinkthatis the biggest incentive. A lot of people want to get vaccinated."'¯ Zimbabwe vice president and Minister of Health Constantino Chiwenga holds up his vaccination certificate after receiving the first shot of Sinopharm, the COVID-19 vaccine from China, Feb. 18, 2021. However,due to doubtsabout the safety and efficacy of China-made vaccines,Hsu saidmany of his foreign friends in Chinaare willing to pay for the option of getting non-Chinese-made vaccines once theyare available in China. ThreeWesternerswho livein China whowereunwilling to reveal their namesfor fear of upsetting authoritiestold VOAMandarin that theywereholding off on getting Chinese vaccines and hoping otheroptionswouldbecome availablesoon. An American citizen told VOAMandarinthat he'¯mightwait for a truly quarantine-free vaccine passport to be introduced before consideringgetting vaccinated. He hopedthat China and the U.S. wouldhave mutual recognition of vaccines as soon as possible.'¯ All the Westernerstold VOAMandarinthat travelingwithout quarantinerestrictions would beanincentive for businesspeopleto obtain Chinese-madevaccines. She added she wouldevaluate the safety and efficacy of anyvaccine beforegetting inoculated.Shesaid shepreferredto wait forBeijingto import the Pfizer vaccine andwouldthenpay for the shotsherself. She added that shewasin no hurry to getinoculatedbecause of the lackofdataonall the vaccines. In China,Hong Kong is the only region thatoffersvaccines from both Pfizer and Sinovac. But after a month of vaccinations, Chief Executive Carrie Lam said last week that only about 500,000people,or7.5%ofHong Kong's population,have been vaccinated, half of them with Chinese-madeSinovacdoses. According to [3]statistics from the Hong Kong Department of Health, as ofApril 16, 16people have died after being vaccinated. Of those, 14died afterbeing inoculatedwith Sinovac vaccines. The other two people died aftergettingthePfizer vaccine. The Sinovac number includes older peoplefor whom vaccinations were not recommended.'¯ FILE PHOTO: Workers unload a shipment of Chinese company Sinopharm's coronavirus disease (COVID-19) vaccine as it arrives at Budapest Airport, Hungary, Feb. 16, 2021. A Taiwanesecitizenliving in Hong Kong,who did not want to be namedfor fear of attractingtheattention of local authorities, told VOAMandarinthat in Hong Kong, Chinese-made vaccines are popular among people who want to visit family in China or foreigners whotravelto China for business.'¯ According tothe [4]Associated Press,the director of the Chinese Center for Disease Control and Prevention,immunologistGao Fu,saidon April 10 thatthecurrentChinese-madevaccineshave low efficacy rates, and mixing dosesis among strategies being considered to boost their effectiveness. The next day,Gaotoldthe[5]Global Times, a Chinese state-run newspaper,thatsome media and foreign social media platformshad misunderstoodhis remarks.= Hisremarksreignited discussions about the effectiveness of China-made vaccines, especially asGaohas not provided datashowing howeffective theChinese-made vaccines areagainst the virus.'¯ Tao Linaof the Shanghai Center for Disease Control and Preventiondescribed the Sinopharm vaccineas"the world's most unsafe vaccine"via Weibo in early January. The postthat saidtheSinopharm vaccinecould cause 73 localorsystemic adverse reactionswas deletedthe next day. In an interview with VOAMandarin, Lo Chun-hsuan, deputy secretary-general oftheTaiwan MedicalAssociation, said that as a major exporter of vaccines, China has a responsibility to make clear the safety and efficacy of its vaccines and to produce empirical clinical data,including laboratory data from phase III,for scientific certification. Risk of COVID-19 variants Losaid China should neitherpoliticize its epidemic prevention efforts nor block other countries'highly effective vaccines to promote its own vaccines or vaccine nationalism.'¯ Hesaid that if the same 70 countriesthathave imported vaccines from China increase their vaccination rates, it may not help prevent the disease andinsteadmay lead to variants of the virusdue to the ineffectiveness of the Chinese-made vaccines. Lo said,"There are two things to think about, the first is that mass vaccinationusing low efficacy vaccineswill cause the variant virus tospreadbecause the virus is not killed under immune pressure. It's like taking a bottle of insecticide and spraying cockroaches, but thebugsare not killed;instead, they become more resistant to the poison. Less-powerful immune pressure will generate more variants of the virus. (Second), these populous countries will in the future become some of the most difficult regions in the world to prevent COVID-19." Adrianna Zhang'¯contributed to this report, which was originated by VOA Mandarin. References 1. https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2021-04-13/are-china-s-covid-shots-less-effective-experts-size-up-sinovac 2. https://www.fmprc.gov.cn/mfa_eng/xwfw_665399/s2510_665401/t1861145.shtml 3. https://newtalk.tw/news/view/2021-04-11/561918 4. https://apnews.com/article/china-gao-fu-vaccines-offer-low-protection-coronavirus-675bcb6b5710c7329823148ffbff6ef9 5. https://www.msn.com/en-gb/news/newslondon/chinese-official-backtracks-on-comments-after-claiming-local-vaccines-dont-have-very-high-protection-rates/ar-BB1fyVmT .