Draft law heralds strict vaccine management: China Daily editorial

How to plug all the loopholes that have been revealed by repeated vaccine scandals involving makers and local watchdogs in recent years became a pressing concern after the most recent scare involving the production of substandard vaccines by Changchun Changsheng Life Sciences Limited.

President Xi Jinping called that incident hideous and said that people's health should always be a top priority. The bottom line of safety should be resolutely safeguarded, he said.

Which is what a new law on the management of vaccines aims to do.

Legal articles concerning the supervision over research, production and distribution of vaccines, and their administering are currently scattered among various laws, a state of affairs that has allowed unscrupulous profiteering and lax production standards to put people’s health at risk. To better regulate the production of vaccines and prevent any substandard or fake vaccines entering the market a single law stipulating how they are to be made, sold, distributed and administered has been long overdue.

Thus the draft of a new vaccine law that has been released by the State Administration of Market Regulation on Sunday for public opinions has been greeted with enthusiasm.

The strict supervision and management set out in the draft, if practiced as specified, will effectively close the loopholes that have been found and preempt any substandard practices or wrongdoing in the production process.

The draft shows that the research, production and distribution of vaccines as well as their use and the observation of reactions to inoculations will be placed under corresponding supervision and management.

Severe penalties are of course more than necessary to deter potential offenders, and the draft stipulates that anyone who fabricates data or documents involving the production of vaccines should be given the severest penalties according to the law as should those who intentionally try to cover up their behavior.

Record keeping is also required at every stage to guarantee traceability, with any laxity or omission to be held accountable.

All these measures are necessary and welcome. Nevertheless, even with a better law, to guarantee the bottom line of safe-to-use vaccines, it is necessary to ensure there is a rigorous supervisory environment to make certain the law is implemented to the letter. That is no less important than the making of a good law.

With the introduction of a new law specifically covering vaccines and stringent supervision to ensure it fulfills the intended purpose, people will be able to have renewed confidence in immunization as a protector of health.