Leprosy vaccine is working in COVID treatment claims Director of IICT

The Council of Scientific and Industrial Research (CSIR) laboratories are conducting research on a versatile strategy to control COVID-19. Since 'Leprosy' vaccine seems useful in the treatment of coronavirus, the researchers are in full swing to manufacture such a vaccine that can prevent the virus from getting into the body.

Hyderabad:Dr S Chandrasekhar, Director of CSIR’s Indian Institute of Chemical Technology (IICT), Hyderabad, said, “We are moving forward with a versatile strategy to control COVID-19. In addition to producing drugs that have been found to be effective against the virus, the focus is on making vaccines that can prevent the virus from getting into the body."

The Council of Scientific and Industrial Research (CSIR) laboratories are conducting research on this, said the IICT. He spoke to Rajya Sabha TV on the COVID- 19 tests, current challenges and the progress of appropriate medicine.

In Reverse Engineering

The Coronavirus which is the reason for the current pandemic of COVID-19 has been creating havoc since the past 4 months. It is difficult to come up with suitable drugs and vaccines that can counter the deadly virus in such a short period. However, IICT has come up with a strategy of manufacturing some of the drugs that have been found to work globally, through a reverse gear engineering methodology.

If a certain drug is manufactured anywhere in the world and even if it has a patent, IICT is manufacturing it in a different process which works out cheaper than the actual process in which it was originally manufactured. This way, the same drug is made available at a cheaper price.

The manufacture of generic medicine is done through reverse gear engineering itself. Wherever a medicine or vaccine is manufactured, it has to be strategized and manufactured even in India as early as possible as we have a large number of FDA approved production plants in different parts of the country.

As far as theActivePharmaceutical Ingredients (API) technology:

A CSIR-based laboratory working in coordination with a Gujarat-based company has manufactured an MW Vaccine that has been created a few years ago, to counter the disease – Leprosy is now found to be useful in treating the Coronavirus too.

Dr Chandrasekhar said, “We are conducting trial tests in four hospitals at present. We have also developed Active Pharmaceutical Ingredients (API) technology concerning other drugs currently in operation. API is the original drug that can treat the disease. But it cannot be taken directly. Other chemicals are added for flavour and colour. Drugs are then manufactured in the form of tablets and syrups. All this is done after the technology of the API has been transferred to the industry."

Favipiravir drug API has been developed by the IICT Scientists with their unrelenting efforts of day and night through a period of 4 weeks.

The drug has been developed with 99.99 per cent of purity. This drug has been used extensively in the manufacture of drugs across countries like China and Japan. We have transferred the technology to a domestic Pharma company who will be producing in large volumes. We are awaiting the Drug Controller approval which is in the clearance phase.