Makers of Covaxin, Bharat Biotech has said that they can modify the vaccine against coronavirus South African variant within 15 days. Bharat Biotech’s developed India’s own vaccine Covaxin against Covid-19 and was rolled out on January 16.
Addressing a Bio-Asia 2021 panel discussion on Monday, Bharat Biotech’s CMD Dr Krishna Ella said that they can re-engineer the vaccine to neutralise the South African variant of the coronavirus within 15 provided they get access to its isolated strain from the Indian Council of Medical Research (ICMR).
The Hyderabad-based company has already supplied 5.5 million doses of its vaccine Covaxin, developed with the government-run Indian Council of Medical Research, to the inoculation campaign in India. The Indian government will be buying another 4.5 million doses for the ongoing domestic vaccination programme, the Bharat Biotech spokesperson said.