new Delhi : India’s apex vaccine advisory body has sought laboratory data and more evidence from Christian Medical College (CMC) Vellore, which is conducting a study on a mixture of Covid-19 vaccines Covaxin and Covishield, said a person aware of the development .
Recently, CMC Vellore presented preliminary findings of the study to the National Technical Advisory Group on Immunization (NTAGI), which makes vaccine recommendations after reviewing data on disease burden, efficacy and cost-effectiveness.
“We have reviewed the preliminary data and have realized that there is a need for more laboratory-based evidence. CMC Vellore is working on it and they have sought at least six weeks’ time to submit the laboratory data.”
Under India’s vaccine mixing protocol, a person who is fully vaccinated against vaccine ‘A’ receives a booster dose of vaccine ‘B’, and vice versa. Last year, the Drugs Controller General of India (DCGI) had given permission to CMC Vellore to conduct the study to evaluate the safety and efficacy of the COVID vaccine mixture.
Queries emailed to CMC Vellore and Union Health Ministry spokespersons remained unanswered at press time.
Globally, around 33 vaccines have been approved for mix-and-match, while India is still working on the protocol.
Meanwhile, India’s active COVID-19 cases have come down to 15,000 after nearly two years of the pandemic. With 1,233 cases reported in the last 24 hours, India is witnessing a steady decline in daily infections.
“India’s active caseload has come down to 14,704, down from 15,000 after 707 days,” the health ministry said.
According to the ministry, around 1,876 patients have been cured in the last 24 hours, taking the cumulative figure of cured patients to 42.4 million. India’s cumulative COVID-19 vaccination coverage has crossed 1.83 billion, with over 15 million doses administered to 12-14 year olds, the health ministry said.
So far 22.8 million people have been vaccinated with a third or booster dose. Meanwhile, the Center has provided over 1.84 billion vaccine doses to states and union territories.
According to the World Health Organization (WHO), India has reported nearly 43 million Covid-19 infections so far, taking the death toll to 5.21 lakh.
The government has also allowed a precaution or booster dose for all the population above 60 years of age, healthcare workers and frontline workers.
Mint on March 22 reported a senior expert from the All India Institute of Medical Sciences (AIIMS) coming against the government’s policy of mixing the COVID-19 vaccine doses, warning that in case of an adverse event, it is not established. It would be very difficult to say which vaccine caused it.
Dr Sanjay Rai, Professor of Community Medicine at AIIMS said, “At this point of time, mixing vaccines is completely irrational. We are using covid19 vaccines for the first time and we should have long term scientific evidence to combine the two drugs. ,
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