NEW DELHI
The efficacy results of the COVID-19 vaccine, manufactured in-house by Covaxin, have been well received by health experts, who expect a boost in the country’s inoculation campaign.
“We expect vaccine confidence and acceptability to increase now. We can also expect the country’s vaccine campaign to increase now,” Drs. Lalit Kant, former head of the Division of Epidemiology and Communicable Diseases, Indian Council for Medical Research. Anadolu Agency.
“I think it is a great success for India because they have manufactured the vaccine from scratch,” he said. Kant, however, says companies need to do a full analysis. “Then we will know the actual effectiveness of the vaccine,” he said.
Covaxin is manufactured by the pharmaceutical company Bharat Biotech in collaboration with the Indian Council of Medical Research.
On Wednesday, the firm announced provisional clinical results based on efficacy data in its phase 3 clinical trial that indicated that Covaxin is 81% effective.
In January, when the government announced the approval of two vaccines, questions were raised about the “premature” approval of Covaxin, as it had not then completed phase 3 trials.
There have been reports of reluctance to get 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 coronavirus. With today’s results of our Phase 3 clinical trials, we have now reported data on our COVID-19 vaccine. of phase 1, 2 and 3 tests that include approximately 27,000 participants, “the firm said in a press release.
According to the company, the vaccine is also highly effective against emerging variants.
“It is significant against emerging variants,” said Dr. Krishna Ella, president and CEO of Bharat Biotech.
“Covaxin demonstrates a high trend in clinical efficacy against COVID-19, but also significant immunogenicity against rapidly emerging variants,” he added.
Dr. Lakshmi PVM, a professor in the Department of Community Medicine at the Postgraduate Institute of Medical Education and Research, told the Anadolu Agency that people will now be used more comfortably.
“It’s a good development. It will help in a way to make people more comfortable taking this vaccine,” he said, adding, “There has been some reluctance to this vaccine. I think it will go away by the announcement of the results. “
Indian government statistics also show that the number of doses of Covaxin is much lower compared to the Covishield vaccine manufactured locally by the Serum Institute of India in Pune and developed by the University of Oxford and AstraZeneca.
The results of the Phase 3 trials have come at a time when India is conducting Phase 2 vaccination against COVID-19 across the country. According to the Ministry of Health of India, so far more than 16 million doses of vaccine have been administered across the country.
Earlier this week, when the country began 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 as of Friday morning, with 157,548 deaths.
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