These decisions were taken by the ministry based on the fresh recommendations by The National Expert Group on Vaccine Administration for COVID-19 (NEGVAC) and have also been communicated to the states and union territories, an official statement said.
The Serum Institute of India is the first Indian company to seek approval for the COVID-19 booster dose.
The decision empowers pregnant women to make an informed choice on taking the Covid vaccination, the ministry said, adding these women can now register on CoWIN or walk-in to the nearest Covid vaccination centre to get themselves inoculated.
The procurement and distribution will be centralised though the government is yet to take a call on the initial number of doses that will be procured.
According to officials, an additional dose of vaccine is different from a booster dose.
The Subject Expert Committee on COVID-19 of the CDSCO on October 12 after deliberating Bharat Biotech's EUA application had recommended granting emergency use approval to Covaxin for use in the 12-18 years age group with certain conditions.
Responding to another question, Choubey said that the phase-I of clinical trials have revealed excellent safety of the two candidate vaccines indigenously developed by Bharat Biotech in collaboration with Indian Council of Medical Research and Cadila Healthcare Ltd, and now their immunogenicity testing is in progress. Their phase II clinical trials are ongoing.
Mandaviya reviewed the pandemic situation, status of vaccination drive and the global scenario of new variants of Covid.
The Kerala high court has directed the Centre to allow scheduling, on CoWIN portal, of second Covishield dose after four weeks from the first for those who want to take it earlier than the present suggested gap of 84 days.
'Better to prevent than to wait for evidence. Protection delayed can also mean protection denied'
The NTAGI has also stated that those having laboratory test proven SARS-CoV-2 illness should defer COVID-19 vaccination for six months after recovery, the sources said.
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