Venezuela to begin trials of Cuban COVID-19 vaccine Abdala

Venezuelan Health Minister Carlos Alvarado on Monday began clinical trials of a Cuban vaccine candidate for coronavirus vaccine Abdala, as the country plans to produce enough doses locally to vaccinate four million people.

In March, Cuba approved approval of Abdala's late trial, named after a poem by 19th-century Cuban independence hero Jose Marti.

The trials should be completed in July and the first results in August, according to Cuban state media.

"We will start a clinical study with this vaccine, but at the same time adapt our national vaccine laboratory too, if all goes well as we hope to produce doses for four million people," Alvarado told state television in Venezuela.

Alvarado spoke at the main airport in Venezuela in the capital Caracas, where he announced that the country had received another 50,000 Russian Sputnik V vaccinations. He said the country had now received a total of 1.48 million coronavirus vaccine doses.

Alvarado also said the new vaccine shipment would be used to vaccinate the country's approximately 360,000 health workers, as well as to begin the process of vaccinating older adults and individuals at risk.

The government of President Nicolas Maduro expects to start receiving vaccinations from the global COVAX vaccination program by July, the health minister added without saying which vaccines would come.

Maduro, whose economy is in a cruel recession marked by hyperinflation in March, said it would not allow the use of the AstraZeneca vaccine following reports of blood clots.

COVAX said in February that it had set aside up to 2.4 million doses of AstraZeneca for Venezuela.

Official data show that the country is suffering from the second wave of COVID-19 infections, with a weekly average of more than 1200 new infections daily.

There are now concerns that hospitals plagued by medicine, understaffing and disruptions, even before the pandemic, could collapse.

More than 200,000 cases of coronavirus and at least 2,170 deaths have been reported in Venezuela so far, according to data collected by Johns Hopkins University.