The Pune-based Serum Institute of India (SII), which is working in collaboration with two other companies that are working towards developing the vaccine for children, will launch Covid-19 vaccine for children above 3 years, within the next six months.
Making an announcement to this effect at an event organised by the Confederation of Indian Industries (CII) here on Tuesday, SII’s CEO Adar Poonawala said, “We have joined the two other companies which are working towards developing the vaccine for children. SII has reached the trial phase of the vaccine for the children aged above 3 and should be ready within 6 months.”
Poonawala announced his company was working towards developing the vaccine booster shot which is more effective to combat Omicron. “On the back of enough data, it is safe to say that booster vaccines are a proven strategy to get antibodies up to a great extent,” he said.
Poonawala said globally, the supply of the vaccines had outmatched its demand and to keep up with the momentum, the countries need to come together and form some pacts in order to prepare standard rules for clinical trials and manufacturing of the vaccines.
“Multilateral organisations and policy makers should be able to identify and isolate the new mutations and find out the efficacy of vaccines against it, in a time bound manner,” he said.
Poonawala’s announcement should be seen in the context of the statement made by him earlier that Covavax -- which is is a version of the Covid-19 vaccine Novavax manufactured by US firm Novavax Inc -would be mass produced by SII mainly for both adults and those below 18 years. He had earlier announced that Covavax for kids would be launched in the first quarter of 2022.
The SII CEO said that with over a billion-dollar investment having gone into developing and manufacturing the Covid-19 vaccine, “the journey so far has given us several key lessons owing to the rapidly changing situation in accordance with the mutating virus”.
Commending the Centre’s role in tackling the challenges posed by the pandemic in the last two years, SII CEO said: “Given the manner in which we dealt with the pandemic, India is now better prepared to deal with such catastrophe. Hopefully the worst is behind us all. The Government of India has been working towards creating an effective healthcare system and has made enough provision for hospital beds and oxygen”
Poonawala -- who was speaking at the CII Partnership Summit 2021, organised in association with Department for Promotion of Industry and Internal Trade (DPIIT), Ministry of Commerce and Industry -- said that going forward, Poonawala said that the Government and Industry should work even more closely to further improve the business environment and simplifying the rules and regulations for manufacturers to expand the sector.
Rajan Navani, Chairman, CII’s India@75 Council and Vice Chairman and Managing Director, Jetline Industries, said that Omicron had posed fresh challenges for the world. “Through the CII’s India@75 campaign, we have been working in several areas since 2008,” Navani added.