Vaccine for COVID-19 by Mid Next Year says MD Biocon

24^th October 2020

Seems like the wait for the COVID-19 vaccine will be long! In a recent interview, Managing Director and Chairperson of Biocon Ltd. – Kiran Mazumdar Shaw said that the vaccine for COVID-19 in India will only be available in the market, by mid-2021. However, she added that the biggest challenge would be its distribution pan-India.

“My expectation is that the first mRNA vaccines will be approved by the end of the year. But they are not going to be available in India because they require a -80 degree cold chain and that is not something which we can handle here,” she said. Further she added, “I expect that by January, some of the other vaccines could be approved like AstraZeneca’s, or one of our own Indian vaccines, like the one by Bharat Biotech. If we finish the clinical trials in the next 2-3 months, even those may be approved by January-February. So, I would expect that in Q1 2021-22 we should have vaccines available in India.” 

Meanwhile, the third phase of clinical trials of Covaxin vaccine has been approved by Drugs Controller General of India (DGCI). This vaccine is being developed by Bharat Biotech in association with the Indian Council of Medical Research (ICMR). Also, the phase 2 human clinical trials of the vaccine developed by Zydus Cadila Ltd. is also underway, and so is the phase 2 and 3 human trials of the vaccine developed by the Serum Institute of India, which has collaborated with AstraZeneca.

Even though in the past few days, the number of positive cases in the country has gone done; the fight with the deadly corona virus is still far from over.