The Osvaldo Cruz Foundation (FioCruz), linked to the Ministry of Health of Brazil, and the pharmaceutical company AstraZeneca signed this Friday (31) the document that will provide the basis for the agreement between the laboratories for the transfer of technology and production of 100 million doses in the country of the vaccine Oxford-AstraZeneca against COVID-19, if its effectiveness and safety are proven.

The document is the second pass between negotiations initiated by the federal government, the British Embassy, and the AstraZeneca laboratory in June this year.

The Ministry of Health foresees an investment of BRL 522.1 million to expand the production capacity of the Fiocruz unit that produces immunobiologicals in order to produce the vaccine. Another BRL 1.3 billion refers to the vaccine’s technology transfer itself.

The Oxford-AstraZeneca vaccine is the most advanced among all those listed by the WHO. It is phase 3, the final phase, still in progress that will show whether the vaccine is effective in immunizing a large number of people.

On July 20, scientists at the University of Oxford published an article in The Lancet, stating that, according to preliminary results, the university’s vaccine for COVID-19 is safe and induced an immune response.

And on the 28th, in an interview with CNN Brasil, the health surveillance secretary at the Ministry of Health, Arnaldo Correia de Medeiros, said that Brazil may receive the first batch of 15 million vaccines in December.