NUR-SULTAN, Kazakhstan – Positive dynamics in eliminating the coronavirus crisis has been outlined in Kazakhstan, Health Minister Alexei Tsoi said at a press conference earlier this week.
“We can talk about a critical situation if our hospitals were full or overcrowded. But now we see 35% of bed occupancy in hospitals. It is important today that our healthcare system can provide everyone with beds and medicines. It is also important that the system has a 70% safety margin for the future,” the minister said, commenting on the current situation in the country with the coronavirus.
He recalled that a month ago, due to the outbreak of pneumonia caused by covid, there were no free beds and medicines in the country’s hospitals. Social networks were full of indignation of Kazakhs.
“Now we have an improvement. The situation is not ideal, but we see positive shifts and we hope that the dynamics will continue,” Tsoi noted.
The Minister recalled that every year in the autumn-winter period in the country the number of cases of acute respiratory infections – viral diseases and influenza is growing.
Given the current COVID-19 pandemic, the Ministry of Health of Kazakhstan is preparing for this development of the situation.
“We have prepared new beds in hospitals. Additionally, we are preparing supplies for PCR testing. We create a stock of drugs in warehouses and in the retail network. Regional authorities also form stocks of personal protective equipment, ventilators, oxygen concentrators. We are preparing for an increase in the number of diseases in the autumn-winter period. If the number of infected people rises sharply, we will accordingly introduce additional measures,” the Minister of Health said.
Kazakhstan plans to complete preclinical trials of a vaccine against COVID-19 of its own production in two weeks. Kazakh scientists of the Research Institute of Biological Safety Problems are also working on the creation of such a vaccine. After testing their vaccine in mice, pigs and macaques, on July 26, five employees of the institute voluntarily tested the vaccine on themselves. After three days, they did not have any allergies or fever, and the volunteers themselves talked about their good health. Preclinical trials of the Kazakh vaccine will end on August 20.
Then, with the approval of the Ministry of Health, the first phase of clinical trials in humans is scheduled for September this year. Forty four volunteers who did not suffer from Covid and, accordingly, did not have antibodies – participants in the first phase. The second phase is scheduled from October to December and will cover two hundred participants. All these experiments will be carried out on the basis of one of the Almaty clinics.
If Kazakhstan’s candidate vaccine gives results and receives WHO approval, then Kazakhstan will be able to provide the vaccine not only for itself, but also for residents of other countries.
By the time the clinical trials are completed, the country’s authorities intend to launch a plant for the production of immunobiological drugs at the Research Institute of Biological Safety Problems. According to the project, the plant will be able to produce up to 60 million doses of vaccine per year.
