Serum Institute has the capacity to make 250 million doses of Covishield monthly.
Bharat Biotech is targeting to manufacture one billion doses of its intra-nasal vaccine in 2022 which is under clinical trials now.
'Antibodies remain in the blood for at least seven to nine months.'
'Someone may have diabetes, but at what level the disease qualifies as a comorbid condition is something a doctor will decide upon and certify accordingly.'
If the vaccine is recommended for use as a booster against Omicron, it may significantly boost the demand for Covishield in India.
As the Omicron variant of Sars-CoV-2 takes centrestage, vaccine makers in India are of the view that scaling up the existing vaccines to make them more effective is possible.
The share of total health expenditure as part of the gross domestic product (GDP) went down to 3.3 per cent in 2017-18 from 3.8 per cent in the previous two years, according to the national health account data released on Monday by the health ministry. The share of government expenditure as part of total expenditure as well as GDP has gone up from from 3.78 per cent to 5.12 per cent between 2013-14 and 2017-18, which could also explain a decline seen in out of pocket expenditure in 2017-18. Health ministry also emphasised the increase in the government health expenditure as part of the total GDP from 1.15 per cent in 2013-14 to 1.35 per cent in 2017-18.
After ramping up production to meet the steep demand spike during the Covid-19 pandemic, Indian medical device makers are now struggling with idle capacity. According to industry estimates, around a third of the installed capacity, especially for consumables, disposables, small-ticket electronic items, etc., is lying unutilised. Sample this: India used to produce just 6.24 million pieces of PPE kits per annum before the pandemic, but by June this was ramped up to 233.87 million pieces per annum.
'Antiviral treatment will have no change. Spike protein change may affect the immunity protection.'
With around 2 million Covid vaccine doses likely to get wasted in December, leading hospital chains have now started to give it gratis to citizens. Sohini Das and Ruchika Chitravanshi report.
A nasal vaccine, one expert said, is a "fantastic idea" for two reasons -- one, it can potentially create sterile immunity, and two, it is easy to administer and thus scalable.
Experts, however, feel that given the intensity of the second wave and the high single dose coverage, India is in a good position to avoid any drastic wave in the near future.
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In September, Bharat Biotech aimed to supply 35 million doses, and take this up to 55 million by October. This is still less than what the Indian government expects from the company.
The sudden spike in cases of fever in India has claimed over 100 lives in five states, including UP, MP, Bihar, Haryana, and West Bengal. In UP, Firozabad and Mathura alone have reported 72 cases.
Pfizer can show the FDA approval to the Indian regulator and present a case that based on whatever data submitted, the US regulator has granted a full marketing nod, says Sohini Das.
The Centre is looking to procure around 1 billion syringes between September and December to support the COVID-19 vaccination drive.
Gennova has also got permission for phase-2 and 3 clinical trials for its lyophilised mRNA vaccine for injection from the subject expert committee advising the Central Drugs Standards Control Organisation, reports Sohini Das.
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