Serum Institute of India begins 3rd phase clinical trials of COVID-19 vaccine on patients

In a massive development, a vaccine developed by Pune's Serum Institute of India (SII) is currently being tested at several Pune hospitals like - Ruby Hall, KEM Pune, Jehangir Hospital. Serum is carrying out phase 3 clinical trials of the Recombinant-BCG vaccine in 30 locations across the nation, as per reports. The phase-3 trials will improve the innate ability to fight the virus and reduce the severity, claim SII.

Serum Institute to begin Covid vaccine production to get head start in case trial succeeds

Corona vaccine being tested

Reports state that the clinical trials have been ongoing for the past 10 days on several categories of patients to study the effects for research purposes. Patients belonging to Corona suspects, positive symptomatic and positive asymptomatic have been administered the vaccine. While tests are scheduled to commence soon, city authorities have stated that a lot of statistical data needs to be gathered before medicine goes for final approvals.

Oxford's COVID-19 vaccine trial has only 50% chance of success, says director

Serum begins work on COVID-19 vaccine

On April 27, Serum Institute of India (SII)  - one of largest producers of vaccines in the world revealed that it will begin work on the production of the COVID-19 vaccine which has been developed by Oxford University within 2-3 weeks. The Pune-based firm revealed that if clinical trials of the vaccine are successful then the COVID vaccine would be out in the market by October. Over 800 healthy volunteers have been recruited for the study being injected with ChAdOx1 nCoV-19, making this the sixth coronavirus vaccine to enter the first phase of clinical trials.

Adar Poonawalla while speaking to news agency PTI added that their firm had been working closely with Dr Hill from Oxford University and was looking to produce five million doses per month for the first 6 months, following which, they hoped to scale up production to 10 million doses per month. The vaccine is made from a weakened version of a common cold adenovirus taken from chimps and genetically modified to make it impossible for it to infect humans, as per a statement. SII added that it will not patent any Covid-19 vaccine which it develops, making it available for all to produce and sell, not just in India but across the world.

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50% success chance rate

But, recent reports reveal that the University of Oxford's experimental vaccine has only a 50 percent chance of success, as stated by Adrian Hill, one of the professors heading the program.  As per reports, Oxford's Jenner institute is developing a potential vaccine with a pharmaceutical company AstraZeneca Plc, which is being considered as one of the front-runners in the global race to provide a shield against the deadly disease. The work on the vaccine started in early January a day after scientists decoded the genomes of the virus, which much faster than any other vaccine development program took place in history.  

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