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Covid-19 vaccine update: UK to begin Pfizer vaccinations, Bharat Biotech seeks nod for emergency use in India
South Korea’s government has said it has signed deals with four firms-AstraZeneca, Pfizer, Moderna and Johnson & Johnson-to vaccinate a total of 44 million people.
The United Kingdom will on Tuesday become the first country to administer doses of Pfizer Inc-BioNTech SE’s vaccine candidate against the coronavirus disease (Covid-19), in what is perhaps the most critical development in the worldwide search for a shot. Last week, the UK health authorities had granted emergency use authorisation (EUA) to the vaccine candidate.
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In India, Hyderabad’s Bharat Biotech International Limited on Monday became the third firm to seek approval for its vaccine candidate, Covaxin, for emergency cases. Last week, both Pfizer and Pune-based Serum Institute of India (SII) had applied to be granted EUA in India. Bharat Biotech has thus become the second Indian firm, after SII, to seek approval for use in emergency cases in India.
Here are the latest developments on the Covid-19 vaccine front:
1. The UK’s National Health Service (NHS) has said people over the age of 80 will be given first preference in what the agency has described as the “biggest immunisation campaign” in its history. Vaccinations will begin early Tuesday morning in what prime minister Boris Johnson says is a “huge step forward” in the fight against the coronavirus, of which the country has more than 1.7 million cases with more than 61,000 people succumbing to the infection.
2. Bharat Biotech, whose Covaxin is in the third stage of trials in India, has applied to the Drug Controller General of India (DCGI) seeking approval for its candidate to be used in emergency cases. Covaxin, which has been developed in collaboration with the Indian Council of Medical Research (ICMR), will be India’s first indigenous Covid-19 vaccine if approved. It is also the first vaccine candidate to have reached Phase 3 trials in India.
3. South Korea’s government has said it has signed deals with four firms to vaccinate a total of 44 million people. While 20 million doses each will be delivered by AstraZeneca, Pfizer and Moderna, four million more doses will be delivered by Johnson & Johnson’s Janssen. Additional 10 million doses will be procured through the World Health Organization’s global vaccine project, COVAX.
(With agency inputs)
