NEW DELHI
The efficacy results of Covaxin, India’s domestically manufactured COVID-19 vaccine, have been welcomed by health experts, who expect a boost in the country’s vaccination campaign.
“We expect confidence and acceptability of the vaccine to increase now. We can also expect the country’s vaccination campaign to get a boost now,” said Dr. Lalit Kant, former Head of the Epidemiology and Communicable Diseases Division of the Indian Medical Research Council. Anadolu agency.
“I think it is a great achievement for India to make the vaccine from scratch,” he said. However, Kant says companies should come up with a full analysis. “Then we’ll get to know the actual efficacy of the vaccine,” he said.
Covaxin is made by pharmaceutical company Bharat Biotech in collaboration with the Indian Council of Medical Research.
On Wednesday, the company announced interim clinical results based on efficacy data in its Phase 3 clinical trial, which indicated that Covaxin is 81% effective.
In January, when the government announced the approval of two vaccines, questions arose about Covaxin’s “premature” approval, as it had not completed phase 3 studies at the time.
There have been reports of reluctance to take the coronavirus vaccine from various parts of the country since the government began its vaccination campaign in January.
“Today is an important milestone in vaccine discovery, for science and our fight against the coronavirus. With today’s results from our Phase 3 clinical trials, we now have data on our Phase 1, 2 COVID-19 vaccine. and 3 studies involving approximately 27,000 participants, ” the company said in a news report.
According to the company, the vaccine also has a high efficacy against emerging variants.
“It is significant against emerging variants,” says Dr. Krishna Ella, Chairman and General Manager of Bharat Biotech.
“Covaxin shows a high clinical trend of efficacy against COVID-19, but also significant immunogenicity against the rapidly emerging variants,” he added.
Dr. Lakshmi PVM, a professor in the Department of Community Medicine in the Post Graduate Institute of Medical Education and Research, told Anadolu Agency that people will now be more comfortable using it.
“It’s a good development. It will help in a way that people will feel more comfortable taking this vaccine,” she said, adding, “There is some reluctance against this vaccine. I think it will. disappear by the announcement of the results. “
Statistics from the Indian government also show that the number of Covaxin doses is much lower compared to the Covishield vaccine that is locally produced by the Pune-based Serum Institute of India and developed by Oxford University and AstraZeneca.
The results of the Phase 3 studies have come at a time when India is implementing Phase 2 of COVID-19 vaccination across the country. More than 16 million doses of vaccine have been administered across the country to date, according to the Indian Ministry of Health.
Earlier this week, as the country entered the second phase of vaccination, Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi received his first dose of Covaxin vaccine.
The total number of cases in the country was 11,173,761 Friday morning, with 157,548 dead.
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