New Delhi: Amid criticism of what many consider to be ‘premature’ emergency use approval given to Bharat Biotech’s Covaxin, a senior scientist of Indian Council of Medical Research (ICMR) vouched for the safety of the indigenously developed COVID-19 vaccine.
“The vaccine that India has developed (Covaxin) presents to the immune system a wide array of antigens, so the immunity which will be produced after vaccination is expected to address the mutants as well,” ICMR’s head of epidemiology and communicable diseases division Dr Samiran Panda told ANI.
Covaxin is still in the third phase of trial, but Dr Panda urged people to ignore myths and misconceptions floating around COVID-19 vaccines.
Many are sceptical about the speed at which coronavirus vaccines have been developed.
“In older days, it would take 20-30 years to get a vaccine or medicine out in the market. Given the knowledge about the whole genome of the virus, the vaccine (Covaxin) has come out within 10-12 months, which underlines the superiority, ability and commitment of Indian scientists.”
Odisha government on Wednesday received 20,000 doses of Covaxin.
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