Bharat Biotech studying Covaxin's efficacy against Omicron

Indian vaccine developer Bharat Biotech, which developed the country’s only killed-virus based vaccine Covaxin said it had been studying Covaxin’s efficacy against the Omicron variant, writes ETV Bharat's Krishnanand Tripathi.

New Delhi: Hyderabad-based vaccine developer Bharat Biotech has been studying whether indigenously developed Covaxin will work against Omicron, the new and more deadly version of the Covid-19 virus, which has been identified in South Africa last week, ETV Bharat has learnt.

The new, more transmissible version of SarS-CoV-2 virus, which has been designated Omicron by the World Health Organisation, was first reported to the global health body on Wednesday. Within two days, the WHO declared Omicron a variant of concern and called for global response to prevent its spread.

The discovery of the Omicron variant has raised alarm bells across continents with several countries restricting the entry of foreigners and increasing surveillance to trace the virus.

While Japan completely stopped the entry of foreigners in India, Prime Minister Narendra Modi chaired a high-level meeting on Saturday and asked the officials to review the plan to resume the normal international flight operations from the next month.

Emergence of a deadlier version of Covid-19 virus from Africa, which was not as severely impacted with the outbreak of Covid-19 global pandemic as Europe, America and some Asian countries, has put the spotlight on the effectiveness of existing Covid vaccines against the Omicron variant, including vaccines developed and produced in India.

These fears gained currency as the CEO of US drug-maker Moderna, which manufactures mRNA based shot against the virus, hinted at a significant drop in the efficacy of Covid vaccines against the Omicron variant in comparison with the Delta variant which was responsible for a deadly second wave in India in April-May this year.

The Delta variant later caused mayhem in several other countries, including the USA where it remains the dominant variant.

Indian vaccine developer Bharat Biotech, which developed the country’s only killed-virus based vaccine Covaxin (a whole-virion inactivated vaccine), said it had been studying Covaxin’s efficacy against the Omicron variant.

“Covaxin was developed against the original Wuhan variant, it has also shown that it can work against other variants, including the delta variant,” a company source told ETV Bharat.

In response to a question about the company’s plan for reworking the formula of Covaxin to deal with the emerging threat of new variants such as Omicron, the source said the vaccine manufacturer continues to research new variants.

Covaxin was developed in partnership with the two state-owned agencies, the Indian Council of Medical Research (ICMR) and the National Institute of Virology (NIV) Pune.

In a real world study conducted by Lancet Infectious Diseases Journal on the efficacy of Covaxin against the Delta variant, Covaxin was found to be 50% effective in preventing symptomatic infection.

The Lancet study, which was released last week, covered 2,714 healthcare workers at the All India Institute of Medical Sciences (AIIMS) in New Delhi, from April 15 to May 15, who were symptomatic and underwent RT-PCR test for COVID-19 detection.