India may launch Covaxin on August 15, 2020

New Delhi: Covaxin, the Indian vaccine for Corona virus, may be launched on August 15, 2020. The Indian company Bharat Biotech is preparing hard to complete all formalities and launch the vaccine on India’s Independence Day. The human trial for the vaccine is beginning July 7.

Covaxin is being developed by Indian pharma company Bharat Biotech. The company has got permission for human trials a few days back.

The Director General of ICMR has said in a letter that the human trial of the vaccine will begin on July 7 and this should not be delayed at all so that it may be launched for the public on August 15.

This vaccine is being developed jointly by Bharat Biotech and National Institute of Virology. The CDSCO had permitted BBIL (Bharat Biotech India Ltd) to conduct human clinical trials in July.

NIV isolated a strain of the novel coronavirus from an asymptomatic patient and then gave it to BBIL in May. After that an ‘inactivated’ vaccine was developed using dead virus.

This vaccine uses inactivated viruses and therefore has no potential to infect or replicate inside human body.

In the first phase, effective dosage were determined and side effects were studied. The second phase of trials is e conducted on a group of people to study different aspects.

The developers are trying hard to complete all the work and formalities so that the vaccine may be launched on August 15, 2020.

If everything goes well, India may be the first country to have developed a vaccine for Covid-19.

There are a number of other vaccines too being developed elsewhere in the world and a few of them are in advances phases.

A race is on among pharma companies to launch a vaccine for corona virus.