New Delhi: ‘Codagenix’ said Tuesday that Serum Institute of India has started manufacturing the US biotech firm’s potential COVID-19 vaccine. Codagenix said it expects to begin early-stage human trial of the COVID-19 vaccine by the end of 2020 in the UK.
Serum Institute is the world’s largest vaccine maker by number of doses produced. It will develop Codagenix’s CDX-005, which is delivered intranasally rather than via an injection.
Serum Institute is working on several vaccine candidates for the novel coronavirus. Among them it will be potentially mass-producing the one from AstraZeneca-Oxford University. The COVID-19 vaccine that is being developed by Oxford University had garnered global headlines. Even though the third stage trials of the vaccine was stopped for a few days as a couple of volunteers showed side effects, it has resumed again.
More than 150 potential vaccines are being developed and tested globally, with 38 in human trials. Vaccine candidates from Moderna, Pfizer and AstraZeneca are already in late-stage trials.
Union Health Minister Harsh Vardhan has said that if everything goes on schedule and according to plans, there will be a vaccine for COVID-19 ready early next year. However, that proposition does not look very promising as of now. Many countries have stated that they are ready to go ahead and vaccinate people even before the trials are completed.