India will have more than one Covid-19 vaccine by early next year: Harsh Vardhan
1 min read 13 Oct 2020, 10:43 AM IST'We're expecting that early next year we should have vaccine in the country from maybe more than one source,' Harsh VardhanCovid-19 vaccines currently in trial in India are 2 dose and 3 dose vaccines
PremiumUnion Health Minister Harsh Vardhan today said that India will have a vaccine for the novel coronavirus from maybe more than one source by early next year. He made this statement during a meeting with Group of Ministers. "We're expecting that early next year we should have vaccine in the country from maybe more than one source. Our expert groups are formulating strategies to plan on how to roll out the distribution of the vaccine in the country," News agency ANI tweeted quoting Harsh Vardhan.
With a spike of 55,342 new cases and 706 deaths in the last 24 hours, India's Covid-19 tally reached 71,75,881 today, according to the data released by Union Health Ministry. The coronavirus count includes 8,38,729 active cases, and 62,27,296 cured and discharged or migrated cases.Further, with 706 deaths reported due to the disease in the last 24 hours, the toll due to the disease is at 1,09,856 in the country.
On Sunday, Harsh Vardhan had warned the people of the country to stay away from large congregations and follow the guidelines issued by the government regarding precautions in view of the upcoming festival season.
Speaking at his 'Sunday Samvaad' programme, he said the possibility of increased novel coronavirus transmission during winters as it is a respiratory virus and the transmission of respiratory viruses is known to increase during the colder weather.
2 dose and 3 dose vaccines
COVID-19 vaccines currently in trial in India are 2 dose and 3 dose vaccines. Vaccine by Serum Institute of India and Bharat Biotech require 2 Doses while the Cadila Healthcare vaccine requires 3 Doses. For other vaccines in preclinical stages, the dosing is being tested.
Covid-19 vaccines in trial in India
Currently, two indigenously-developed vaccine candidates, one by Bharat Biotech in collaboration with ICMR and the other by Zydus Cadila Ltd, are in phase 2 of the human clinical trials.
Pune-based Serum Institute of India, which has partnered with AstraZeneca for manufacturing the Oxford Covid-19 vaccine candidate also, is conducting phase 2 and 3 human clinical trials of the candidate in India.
