2021: YEAR OF THE VACCINE?If 2020 was the year of the pandemic, 2021 could turn out to be the year of the vaccine.
Recently, Union health and family welfare minister Harsh Vardhan said India could have a vaccine by year-end. Three vaccine candidates are being tested currently in the country.
The Oxford-AstraZeneca vaccine Covishield, to be manufactured by Pune’s Serum Institute of India, is in combined phase 2 and 3 trials.
Bharat Biotech-ICMR’s COVAXIN, the first indigenous covid-19 vaccine, and Zydus Cadila’s ZyCov-D, are in phase 2 trials.WHY PHASE 3 TRIALS MATTERAccording to the World Health Organization’s (WHO’s) draft landscape of covid-19 candidate vaccines, 33 are in clinical evaluation right now.