Vietnam announced Tuesday, July 2, that it was the first to succeed in creating a vaccine to control African swine fever, which hit farms across the country and culled about 10% of the total population.

“I think we are on the right track, and soon we will have a vaccine,” Vietnam's Minister of Agriculture, Nguyen Suan Quong, said on Tuesday, July 2, through the Vietnamese official news agency (VNA).

And in a separate message from the state-owned broadcaster of Vietnam Television (VTV) also on July 2 it was reported that the vaccine developed at the Vietnam National Agricultural University was tested in his laboratory and at three farms in northern Vietnam.

The vaccine and African swine fever experts, however, were skeptical of the claims of progress and stated that much more research was needed to prove the viability of any vaccine.

“We need different phases of clinical trials, first in a controlled experimental setting, and then in a field test with the natural exposure to the virus, and this cannot be a small test,” said Dirk Pfeiffer, professor of veterinary epidemiology at City University of Hong Kong.