The US researchers sounded the alarm.

In May 2020, the American government funded the development of Covid vaccines with "Operation Warp Speed" under President Donald Trump with the help of 10 billion dollars.

Now America is in danger of falling behind in the development of new vaccines, Yale immunologist Akiko Iwasaki and cardiologist Eric Topol, one of the most cited scientists in medicine, wrote in the journal Science Immunology at the end of July.

Henrik Ankenbrand

Economic correspondent for China based in Shanghai.

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The "early and amazing success" of the mRNA vaccines from Biontech and Moderna, for example, gave rise to the idea that the spread of the virus could actually have been stopped - but the omicron variant had dashed this hope.

If the chain of infection is to be broken, a disease and its long-term consequences (Long Covid) prevented, a new billion-euro program to develop a nasal spray must be developed that fights the virus where it enters the body - and according to tests is more effective than the spades in the Poor.

What resonated in the researchers' contribution only in the undertone: Ironically, America's great rival China had made amazing progress in the development of a vaccine for inhalation.

How far the Chinese had rushed seemed to have surprised American scientists as well.

The Chinese pharmaceutical company CanSino has just announced from the economic metropolis of Tianjin near Beijing that its vaccine for inhalation has received emergency approval from the Chinese authorities and is now being distributed to the people in the country as a booster vaccination.

CanSino scientists said they hope their spray will be available outside of China by the end of the year.

So far no nationwide vaccination campaign

"Will that bring about a turning point?" asked the renowned science magazine "Nature" on Tuesday.

On Wednesday, CanSino promptly rose almost 9 percent on the Hong Kong Stock Exchange.

The manufacturer actually had a catastrophic first half of the year behind it.

Since the spread of the omicron variant, China's government had sent half the country into lockdown because more than 100 million people over the age of 60 were not or not fully vaccinated.

But getting vaccinated was only available to foreigners in private hospitals in cities like Shanghai, where citizens were confined to their homes for over two months.

CanSino, whose previous Covid vaccine is administered with a single injection,

The fact that Beijing has not yet rolled out a nationwide vaccination campaign and instead accepts that China's economy is sliding towards a recession in view of the repeated lockdowns could also have something to do with the low effectiveness of the domestic vaccines.

Foreign industry representatives such as EU Chamber of Commerce chief Jörg Wuttke have repeatedly denounced the fact that China's government "does not trust its own vaccines".

The World Health Organization (WHO), for example, states the effectiveness of CanSinos vaccine administered by needle as just 58 percent - the vaccine from the Mainz-based manufacturer Biontech, for example, has an effectiveness rate of 75 percent according to the Robert Koch Institute.

However, the rates refer to the delta variant of the virus.

With Omikron, the effectiveness is lower.

This is exactly where nasal sprays should help.

The hope: Unlike when injected into the muscle, the vaccine can prevent disease and transmission of the virus much better if it is administered where the virus spreads, namely in the lungs.

If the vaccine could give the body immunity, this would be the much-cited “game changer” in the pandemic, writes “Nature”, a decisive turning point.

Foreign vaccines banned in China

The fact that China of all places is now making the headlines with the development of Covid vaccines comes as a surprise.

So far, despite government money and cooperation between companies, the state and the military, the country has not been able to get a vaccine with the more effective mRNA technology used by companies like Biontech past the stage of clinical testing.

The fact that China's leadership is imprisoning large parts of the population for fear of millions of deaths is mainly due to the fact that President Xi Jinping has banned the import of proven foreign vaccines such as those from Biontech out of national pride.

However, it is far from clear whether the new nasal spray from CanSino will bring resounding success.

Vaccines that are absorbed through the mucous membrane are also approved in Russia and Iran.

India followed suit by approving a nasal spray two days after the Chinese rushed ahead.

Clinical tests by CanSino have shown that the number of antibodies that are supposed to neutralize the virus after it has penetrated the lungs was higher when using the inhaler than when the vaccine was injected into the muscle.

However, much more testing is needed to confirm the Chinese's success, writes Nature in a report.

Producing a vaccine that stops the spread of the virus and even prevents mild courses of the disease: this bar is "high".