Cuba’s New Covid-19 Vaccine Finds Testing Ground in Venezuela

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Struggling to acquire Covid-19 vaccine doses, Venezuela’s Maduro regime goes for shots from its Cuban ally even as health experts warn about the Abdala vaccine

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Cuba says it has developed a vaccine against Covid-19 that its ally, Venezuela, has begun administering despite warnings from regional health authorities and Venezuelan doctors that they haven’t seen evidence of the shot’s efficacy or safety.

Cuban doctors working in Venezuela are applying the three-dose vaccine called Abdala, with 10,000 people having received the first jab in recent days at a Caracas military base, the first batch from a 12-million-dose contract signed between the two nations. Abdala, named after a poem by Cuban independence-era hero José Martí, has an efficacy rate of 92% against Covid-19, with each of three shots administered 14 days apart, Cuban authorities say. But its experimental data haven’t been published in scientific journals, and it isn’t included on the World Health Organization’s list of vaccines approved for emergency use in battling the coronavirus.

The little that is known about Abdala comes from celebratory public comments made by Cuban officials to state media in recent months. Phase 3 trials ended in April, and the Public Health Ministry says more than one million out of the island’s 11 million people have received a dose. On state media, Cuba’s government has dismissed criticism of its homegrown shot. The country has extensive experience in vaccine development: Its meningitis and Hepatitis-B vaccines are exported to developing countries in Latin America and elsewhere. The state-run healthcare system has been an emblem of its communist government and an essential revenue generator.

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