E-Paper
Rohtak PGIMS starts screening for BCG vaccine trials
Under this research trial, rBCG vaccine will be given to 131 persons (aged above 18 with no disease) while the remaining 44 will be given placebo.
A team of three doctors at Rohtak’s Post Graduate Institute of Medical Sciences (PGIMS) has started screening of employees for clinical trials to find the efficacy of the tuberculosis vaccine, the recombinant (zenotype) Bacillus Calmette Guerin (BCG), to protect people from the novel coronavirus.
Professor of community medicine at the PGIMS, Dr Ramesh Verma, who is co-investigator for clinical trials said that the team has conducted screening of 10 PGIMS employees who are attending to Covid-19 patients. Four of these employees have undergone a Covid-19 test and their results have already come out negative.
“We will inject the recombinant Bacillus Calmette Guerin (BCG) vaccine to them on Saturday. This trial will be performed on 175 persons, including doctors, staff nurses, attendants and others looking after Covid-19 patients at PGIMS and the family members of the positive patients, who have tested negative for the virus. Under this research trial, we will give rBCG vaccine to 131 persons (aged above 18 with no disease) and the remaining 44 will be given placebo (no treatment). To perform these trials, we received a stock of 75 vaccines and we will get the remaining ones in the next two to three days,” Dr Verma added.
Professor Verma said that they will conduct this research about the efficacy of rBCG vaccine for the next six months.
“Early Covid-19 trends show that the deadly virus is not severe in developing countries, where TB vaccines are given to infants. This rBCG vaccine is being used for trial as it improves immunity and has anti-viral properties. The final research will tell us whether this vaccine is helpful in tackling the virus or not,” Professor Ramesh Verma added.
The drug controller general of India (DCGI) has granted permission to five sites, including PGIMS, Rohtak, to hold a clinical trial for the rBCG for the next six months. The research is being conducted under the guidance of Professor of pharmacology and general investigator Dr Savita Verma, head of pulmonary and critical care medicine, Dr Dhruva Chaudhary and Dr Ramesh Verma.
Dr Dhruva Chaudhary, who is also the coronavirus nodal officer at the institution, said that the BCG vaccine was developed to protect children from tuberculosis and they expect that the rBCG vaccine may offer protection against the severity of Covid-19 as it is helpful in tackling other infectious diseases too.
