With 10 million cases and over a half-million loss of lives, Coronavirus has spread globally. The only defense is a vaccine. From America to Chins to Russia to India, the best of the scientists are working tirelessly to develop a vaccine. Luckily, some of their efforts are proven fruitful.
Seven Covid-19 Vaccine Candidate Companies in India
In India, seven companies, Zydus Cadila, Bharat Biotech, Serum Institute, Indian Immunologicals, Biological E, and Mynvax and Panacea Biotec, are striving hard for a vaccine. Generally, a vaccine would require 10-15 years. But the current global threat has made the world to develop a vaccine ASAP.
Fortunately, two of the seven Indian companies received the green light from the Drugs Controller General of India (DCGI) for human clinical trials. Bharat Biotech’s COVAXIN and Ahmedabad-based Zydus Cadila Healthcare Ltd’s ZyCov-D gets a green signal for human clinical trials.
A vaccine for Covid-19 has become a global cause and more than 100 international companies are working on it. Various vaccines from these 100 candidates are being tested in humans and they have shown potential in early-stage trials. But to date, no vaccine is proven for commercial use. These vaccines work better in the early stages but proved ineffective in other stages.
One of the largest vaccine producers and suppliers of the world, India, like the rest of the vaccine producers, looking for speedy trails to win against the pandemic causing destruction everywhere. The country is also adversely affected by the pandemic with 625,000 confirmed cases and the death toll is above 18,000.
COVAXIN, Bharat Biotech
One of the seven companies working on the Covid-19 vaccine Bharat Biotech claims to develop India’s first COVID-19 vaccine, COVAXIN, successfully. The company said in a statement that it gets permission from the drug controller to start human clinical trials. The Indian Council of Medical Research (ICMR) confirmed the vaccine to be launched by August 15.
COVAXIN, the first indigenous coronavirus vaccine is one of the top priorities of Indian government and is being monitored at the topmost level.
ICMR and BBIL are working jointly for preclinic and clinical development of the vaccine which is derived from a strain of SARS-CoV-z isolated at ICMR- National Institute of Virology, Pune.
ZyCoV-D, Zydus Cadila Healthcare group
Ahmadabad-based healthcare ltd revealed that its Covid-19 vaccine candidate ZyCoV-D has got nods from the Indian authorities. The vaccine candidate has successfully completed the preclinical requirements phase. With the development of ZyCoV-D, Zydus Cadila Healthcare has become the first company to established the DNA vaccine platform. It has used non-replicating and non-integrating plasmid which carrying the gene of interest making it very safe.