The South Korean Ministry of Health and Welfare is holding an initial meeting to work out how the country intends to purchase and supply foreign-made COVID-19 vaccines here, amid buzz surrounding US drug giant Pfizer’s early results.

Senior health official Yoon Tae-ho told reporters during a briefing Thursday morning that the ministry was speaking with medical experts behind closed doors later that day.

“From what I understand this is the first meeting to be held for planning vaccine deals,” he said. The main item on the agenda was to be “laying down the criteria for determining which vaccines will be brought in,” he added.

Yoon said the government is “in talks with several multinational pharmaceutical companies with promising candidates,” but that no deals have been finalized just yet. He gave no further details, citing confidential business information.

In a briefing held the same day, the Korea Disease Control and Prevention Agency’s Deputy Director Kwon Jun-wook said the government is “willing to risk making advance purchase deals of candidate vaccines to have as many as possible by the year’s end.”

Governments around the world have been prepurchasing vaccines that are yet to be approved to increase their chances at having ample doses for their own people in advance.

“Our goal is to have enough vaccines to give to at least 60 percent of the population,” the agency’s deputy chief said.

The Health Ministry said in a September Cabinet meeting convened by the Prime Minister’s Office that some 172.3 billion won ($154.5 million) would be set aside for financing advance purchase agreements.

Earlier this week, Kwon said the government aims to start vaccinating people in the second half of next year at the earliest. He said vaccine safety was the first priority in deciding whether to pursue any deals.

He added that Korea was managing the pandemic with relative success, and that the country was “not in an urgent need” to rush into deals.

For the past week, Korea has been reporting around 130 cases per day on average, with the number of Thursday’s new infections recording 143. The cumulative number of official cases is now 27,942.

There are currently 53 severely or critically ill patients with the coronavirus, of whom nearly 70 percent are in their 60s or older. So far the disease has claimed the lives of 487 people here. The fatality rate stands at 1.73 percent.

By Kim Arin (arin@heraldcorp.com)