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Bharati Vidyapeeth hospital administers Covid vaccine to volunteers
The result of phase two clinical trials will determine the further course of action with regards to this vaccine which is the frontrunner vaccine candidate
Pune’s Bharati Vidyapeeth medical college, hospital and research centre will be the first in the country to administer ‘Covidshield’ vaccine in volunteers. The vaccine has been developed by Oxford University in partnership with Swedish pharmaceutical company AstraZeneca and Pune based Serum Institute of India.
The result of phase two clinical trials will determine the further course of action with regards to this vaccine which is the frontrunner vaccine candidate.
Dr Sanjay Lalwani, medical director at Bharati Vidyapeeth medical college, hospital and research centre said, “We have asked for about 300-350 vials of the Covishield vaccine being manufactured by Pune based Serum Institute of India.” The vials arrived on Tuesday evening at the hospital at its Katraj campus.
“Once the vials arrive, we will check the temperature logs of the vaccine. We have also called about five volunteers who will be tested for Covid and presence of antibodies on Wednesday morning. The eligibility criteria is that the person must be aged between 18-99 years without any comorbidities. Also, he or she has to be tested negative for the SARS-CoV-2 virus which causes Covid-19 and tests negative for the antibodies of the virus. So, the person must not be currently or previously infected with Covid. Among the five volunteers, whoever is deemed fit for the vaccination process will be vaccinated. They will be kept under a close check and after a week the next batch of volunteers will be vaccinated,” said Lalwani.
Dr Lalwani added, “We have got approval for first 100 patients and after that we will wait for a week as per the guideline prescribed by the drugs controller general of India and then the rest of the volunteers would be administered the drugs based on the analysis of the vaccine and its impact.”
Among the five volunteers, whoever tests negative for the virus and Covid-19 antibodies will be administered the vaccine on Wednesday. The volunteers will be called on a daily basis to check for symptoms including nausea, fever and other symptoms.
During the trials, the hospital will be responsible for data collections and also lookout for any symptoms or reactions that the volunteers experience due to the vaccine.
The hospital was earlier also part of Serum Institute’s research to determine if the recombinant Bacille Calmette-Guerian (BCG) vaccine can boost immunity to fight against the Covid-19 virus which was a six-month study.
Dr Jitendra Oswal, deputy medical director at hospital said the human candidates will be injected with vaccine doses between 12noon to 2pm on Wednesday.
Besides Bharati hospital’s research centre, three other hospital’s research centres have signed up for this trial, including government-run Sassoon hospital, King Edward Memorial hospital and Jehangir hospital in Pune.
However, this is the first ‘Covidshield’ shot to be administered to volunteers, according to doctors at Bharati hospitals.