Chinese health official says he’s had a mix of 3 Covid-19 shots

Gao Fu, who heads China’s CDC, tells state media he was among the first to get a locally made vaccine in May last year

He earlier called for research into mixing doses to boost efficacy but it is not clear if he is taking part in a study

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Gao Fu, head of China’s CDC, says scientists have been in a game of “cat and mouse” trying to test how well vaccines work against new variants. Photo: Handout

Published: 11:00am, 20 Jul 2021Updated: 11:06am, 20 Jul 2021

China’s top disease control official says he has had a third Covid-19 shot, as global debate continues on the need for extra doses to boost immunity and protect against new variants.

Gao Fu, head of the Chinese Centre for Disease Control and Prevention, also told state-run magazine Global People on Sunday that he had received doses of different Covid-19 vaccines, without elaborating.

“I was among the first to have a domestically developed Covid-19 vaccine when I got the shot in May last year,” Gao was quoted as saying. “I have now had three shots that used different technology and were from different manufacturers and I haven’t felt any discomfort.”

The report did not say why Gao had been given the third jab, and whether it was part of a study.

A resident gets vaccinated in Shenyang, Liaoning province last month. Photo: Xinhua

Gao was the first public health expert in China to call for research into mixing vaccines to try to “resolve the issue that current vaccines don’t have very high protection rates”. That remark in April was widely seen as a public admission of the low efficacy of Chinese vaccines, after more than 164 million doses had already been administered in the country. But he later said it was a general comment about Covid-19 vaccines worldwide, and he was raising the possibility that changing the intervals of doses and mixing technologies could boost immunity.

Chinese drug makers have said they are working on updated versions of their vaccines for more transmissible Covid-19 variants like Delta. Trials have been registered that involve mixing inactivated vaccines – the most used Covid-19 shots in China – with other technologies including the adenovirus-vectored drug produced by CanSino Biologics.