Hundreds of vials were lined up on the belt of a packaging machine at L House, SK Bioscience’s vaccine manufacturing facility in Andong, North Gyeongsang Province, on Wednesday afternoon, as the developer of South Korea’s first homegrown COVID-19 vaccine SKYCovione is poised to roll out the vaccine’s first batch by the end of August.

A few technicians, who were covered from head to toe with sterilized gear -- protective shoes, clothing and hair caps -- oversaw the automatic process while others put finishing touches on the packages.