Trials for Covovax booster dose begin at 4 locations in Pune

PUNE Trials for the booster dose of Covovax vaccine to be administered to adults have started at eight locations across India, including four in Pune district, on Thursday

PUNE Trials for the booster dose of Covovax vaccine to be administered to adults have started at eight locations across India, including four in Pune district, on Thursday. The trials were undertaken at KEM hospital’s Manchar research centre and three other locations in Pune. According to doctors from the hospital, around 370 participants are participating in the trials nationally.

Trials for the booster dose of Covovax vaccine to be administered to adults have started at eight locations across India, including four in Pune district, on Thursday. (REPRESENTATIVE IMAGE)

“The trials will begin from Thursday for testing Covovax as a booster dose in adults who received two doses of Covaxin or Covishield around six months ago,” Dr Ashish Bavdekar, principal investigator at Pune’s KEM hospital research centre said. Besides KEM, trials are also underway at Nobel hospital in Pune.

After Covaxin this is the second vaccine being manufactured by the Serum Institute of India (SII) in the fight against the Covid-19 pandemic. The results of the Covovax trials for 2 to 6 year olds are expected by May-end, after which the process of vaccinating the young population can start.

When contacted, SII spokesperson said that the trials for the vaccines are underway and further details will be revealed after the trials are completed.

Confirming the status of the vaccine trials, Dr Bavdekar said, “The trials for Covovax vaccines for this age bracket are still going on. As it is in phase three of the process, the results can be expected soon.”

The nanoparticle protein-based Covovax vaccine is manufactured in India by the Serum Institute of India (SII). It is developed by technology transfer from US-based Novavax and is approved by the European Medicines Agency for conditional marketing authorisation.

“We started with the trials for 18 year olds. After the Drugs Controller General of India approved the results for the age group of 12 to 17 year olds, the emergency use authorisation was provided for the same,” said Bavdekar.

The paediatric clinical trials for the vaccine are carried out in 10 centres throughout India, including KEM research centre and Bharati hospital research centre in Pune. “The trials are underway at the Vadu village among the semi-urban community. The people were sceptical at first to have children volunteer for the trials. However, after some convincing we got many participants.”

More than 200 children in the age group of 2 to 6 years are part of this trial. They are the youngest in the country to get a Covid vaccine, early this year. When contacted, Dr Jitendra Oswal, deputy medical director of Bharti hospital refused to provide details for an ongoing trial.