Bangladesh has approved the third-phase trial of a potential Covid-19 vaccine developed by China’s Sinovac Biotech Ltd, officials said, as infections continue to rise in the densely-populated South Asian country.

Sinovac has been looking for volunteers outside of China country as the number of coronavirus cases there has dwindled, said a member of Bangladesh’s national technical advisory committee to tackle Covid-19.

The International Centre for Diarrhoeal Disease Research, Bangladesh (ICDDR,B), will conduct the trial that could begin next month.“We have given ethical permission for the trial after reviewing the research protocol,” Mahmood Uz Jahan, director of the Bangladesh Medical Research Council (BMRC), told Reuters.