The possible timeframe for the launch of Covaxin, being jointly developed by Indian Council of Medical Research (ICMR) and Bharat Biotech, got all the more confusing after the Ministry of Science and Technology deleted a sentence “a vaccine is unlikely to be ready for mass use before 2021” from a Press release put out on the Press Information Bureau (PIB) site on Sunday morning.
The Ministry published a Press release titled “Indigenous Indian Covid-19 vaccines in the global race to end the pandemic” on the PIB website. Pointing out that 11 out of 140 vaccine candidates, including the two Indian vaccines — Covaxin and ZyCov — have entered the human trial stage across the globe and added that neither of these is likely to be ready for mass use before 2021.
But soon afterwards, the release was edited, and the line stating “vaccines are unlikely to be ready before 2021,” was removed. The fresh release has no mention of the timeframe.
The Government and ICMR are facing a lot of criticism for trying to push through the vaccine launch by Independence Day. Health experts from across the globe have expressed concern over this “rush” and said no vaccine could be ready for mass use in such short time.
The PIB release said in past years India has emerged as one of the significant vaccine manufacturing hubs and Indian manufacturers account for 60 per cent of vaccine supplies made to UNICEF.
The vaccine for coronavirus may be developed anywhere in the world, but without Indian manufacturers involved the production of required quantity is not going to be feasible, it said.
The release said more than 140 candidate vaccines are under various stages of development. One of the leading candidates is AZD1222 being developed by Jenner Institute of University of Oxford and licenced to AstraZeneca British-Swedish multinational pharmaceutical and biopharmaceutical company headquartered in Cambridge, England, it said.
The MRNA-1273 vaccine developed by Kaiser Permanente Washington Health Research Institute, Washington and taken up for production by the US-based Moderna pharmaceutical is just a step behind. Both these firms have already inked an agreement with Indian manufacturers for production of the Covid vaccines, it said.
“Indian institutions have also engaged in R&D for the development of vaccines in India. With the primary scientific inputs coming from institutions like Pune-based ICMR institution National Institute of Virology and Hyderabad based CSIR institution Center for Cellular and Molecular Biology, six Indian companies are working on a vaccine for COVID-19. Along with the two Indian vaccines, COVAXIN and ZyCov-D, the world over, 11 out of 140 vaccine candidates have entered the human trials,” it said.