DCGI nod obtained, but new vaccines yet to be rolled out

The Drug Controller General of India (DCGI) has given its nod to three vaccines for emergency use in India, apart from Covishield, Covaxin and Sputnik V that are already in use. However, these new vaccines are yet to see the light of day for use in the immunisation drive in India.

Two vaccines that received the DCGI nod for “restricted use in emergency setting” in December last year, are “Covovax”, manufactured by Serum Institute of India (SII), and “Corbevax” of Biological E. The Zydus Cadilamanufactured “Zycov-d” was given emergency usage approval by the DCGI in August last year.

Corbevax and Covovax are protein subunit vaccines, where through the jab the spike protein of the coronavirus is injected into the body to tutor it to strike an immune response in the human body, thus providing immunity against Covid-19.

Zycov-d is the world’s first plasmid DNA vaccine, which can be administered needle free. This vaccine was expected to be rolled out by the end of last year and was expected to be administered to children, since this was one of the first vaccines that received the clearances for it to be administered to children between 12 and 18 years of age.

When Corbevax got the approval last month, Biological E had said in a press statement that around 200 million doses of the vaccine were already lying in their stock at the cold room, and that by February this year, they would be fulfilling the Central government’s order of 300 million doses.

Biological E had also said that the company plans to complete production at the rate of 75 million doses per month, anticipating that 100 million plus doses of the vaccine would be required each month beginning next month.