The Pune-based company, Serum Institute of India, recently announced that they are ready to apply for a license to initiate the clinical trials of the coronavirus vaccine being developed at Oxford University.
Serum Institute of India is the largest vaccine maker in the world in terms of the number of doses produced and sold globally. It has partnered with biopharmaceutical company AstraZeneca to mass-produce the Oxford vaccine. India happens to be amongst the largest manufacturer of pharmaceutical products, specializing in generic drugs which have enabled the Pune-based company to initiate the trials.
In a preliminary report published in The Lancet medical journal, the vaccine is said to produced an immune response and was safe in early-stage clinical trials. The vaccine prompted an antibody response within 28 days and a T-cell response within 14 days. Neutralizing antibodies, which can disable the virus, were detected in most participants after one shot, and in all of them after two. It also highlighted that the small number of participants might be a limitation for the study. Nevertheless, it informed that the developers are now recruiting older age groups with comorbidities, health-care workers, and those with a higher risk for the exposure to the coronavirus to further assess the potential vaccine.
Meanwhile, a day after the coronavirus vaccine being developed by the University of Oxford was said to be showing positive results, a vaccine which is made in China has been found safe as well. A phase 2 trial of a coronavirus vaccine candidate in China's Wuhan has found that the vaccine is safe and induces an immune response, as per the new study published in The Lancet.
According to the latest official figures, the coronavirus which had emerged in the central Chinese city of Wuhan last year has so far killed over 6,06,000 people and infected more than 1,45,38,000 people across the world. In India, the coronavirus has caused 28,084 deaths and infected over 11 lakh people.
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