Pediatric trials of Covaxin likely from Jun 1: Dr Raches Ella

Virtual conversation with members of FICCI Ladies Organisation (FLO) Hyderabad on "All About Vaccines" on Saturday night, Dr Raches said that the trials will on children aged 2-18 years.  Kids vaccine trials of Bharath Biotech may get the license in the third quarter of this year, he gave his confidence.

He said that  few side effects of vaccination are common and that shouldn’t deter anyone from taking vaccine.

Interacting with Dr Pragnya Chigurupati, Consultant--Breast Oncology & Oncoplastic Surgeon who moderated the talk, Dr Raches said if you inject the purest form of water into anybody it is likely to generate few reactions. It is the biological nature of the body. If it doesn’t then there is a problem with your body. Whenever any foreign body enters our body a good body should react. The same is the case with vaccines. That is why we have side effects.

He dispelled various myths about vaccine hesitancy and said COVID Vaccines are safe and everyone should take vaccines.

”I am happy that our hard work is paying off well as the vaccine is working well and saving lives. We have this good feeling when we go back home from work each day. We will be soon ramping up our manufacturing capacity to 700 million doses by the end of this year”, informed Dr. Raches Ella as a response to a question from a participant.

“We are happy to have the full support of the government because of which we are able to stand where we are today in this journey. The vaccine is co-developed by us and ICMR. The government placed an advanced purchase order of Rs  1500 crore. This will help us to increase our risk appetite. That is why we are expanding to Bangalore and Gujarat,” informed the Bharath Biotech executive.

“We focused on developing the product last year, now our focus is on ramping up our manufacturing capacity,” he added.

When Dr Pragnya asked him about challenges he said the success probability of a vaccine is just 6 per cent from discovery to development. That is why we see fewer vaccines, he said and added that the company took the biggest but calculated risk.

In normal circumstances, the development of a vaccine takes anywhere between 7 to 10 years, which we have done in the least possible time. This was never taught in books. This is something I learned practically. The journey was challenging, promising, and fulfilling, Dr Raches explained.