A Well-oiled Machinery

Finding a vaccine suited to India is the least of the problems the government will face. Storing and transporting them at a certain temperature range can be a logistical nightmare, but India is adept at this

- Dr KK Aggarwal

ELEVEN months into the Covid-19 pandemic and the incredible pace of research has already yielded 13 vaccines that are under largescale testing. India’s health minister Dr Harsh Vardhan said on Nov ember 22, 2020, that a locally-developed vaccine could complete its final trials in a month or two, raising hopes for a rapid roll-out in a country with the world’s second highest number of infections.

It is likely that the government will approve one of the vaccines (looks like the Oxford one, which will be subject to the British drug regulator’s approval) by December with emergency use authorisation. This will give it political mileage across the world for launching a vaccine within a year of the pandemic striking.

In addition, the Indian Council of Medical Research and privately-held Bharat Biotech have started third-stage trials of Covaxin in a process that would involve 26,000 volunteers. It is the most advanced Indian experimental inactivated vaccine. The other experimental vaccines on trial in India are the one being developed by AstraZeneca and Oxford University that is being manufactured by Serum Institute of India; Russia’s Sputnik V; Zydus Cadila’s ZyCoV-D and lastly one that Biological E. Ltd is developing with Baylor College of Medicine and Dynavax Technologies Corp.