China emerging as 'major player' for pharmaceuticals

China wants to become a major developer of vaccines for the developing world.

The pharmaceuticals industry is starting to take much more notice of China, as the country emerges as a major developer of vaccines for the developing world.

China's drugs industry is close to being given the go ahead to manufacture the Japanese encephalitis vaccine for the developing world.

According to the British Medical Journal, this will mark it out as a "major new player" in the market.

Seth Berkley, chief executive of the GAVI Alliance, believes that Chinese drugs firms will be ready by the start of next year for the World Health Organization (WHO) to carry out pre-qualifications inspections of production of the vaccine.
There has been a push for contract services with Asia in recent times, thanks to the region's growing presence in the pharma market.

China's rise is likely to further facilitate the establishment of outsourcing agreements between the west and Asia, once it has the processes in place to develop such vaccines on a mass scale to WHO requirements.

Once the WHO checks have been carried out, the UN will be able to purchase the vaccine for countries without their own regulatory systems.