"Working Actively" To Import Moderna's Covid Vaccine: NITI Aayog

Moderna COVID-19 Vaccine: Dr VK Paul, NITI Aayog health member said the Government is making efforts to make the Moderna Covid vaccine available in the country and importing it into the country by actively working with the Moderna manufacturers.

The government revealed today that it is working with Moderna, a pharmaceutical manufacturer to see how its vaccine can be imported and made available in the country as Moderna's COVID-19 vaccine was granted an emergency use permit last month.

"Moderna vaccine is under emergency use authorisation. The government is working diligently with the manufacturers to see how to create this vaccine available in the country, and import the same," said the Aayog member, Dr VK Paul.

Paul also mentioned that the company has yielded its third phase trial results to the Drugs Controller General of India (DCGI) in response to a question regarding the vaccine of drug firm Zydus Cadila. He said that "Zydus Cadila has yielded its phase-3 trial results to the authority and exchange & analysation of the information and scientific evidence is in progress." He also mentioned that children were also included in this trial.

"We should wait for that procedure to complete and for a decision to be outlined by the scientific system in the DCGI," he added.

Among the other COVID-19 vaccine, Pfizer has still not applied for the Emergency use authorisation. The company is in talks with the government asking for legal protection in case of any adverse effects.

Two cases of the Kappa variant have been discovered in Uttar Pradesh. Kappa is also referred to as a "double mutant" as this variant has been discovered to carry over multiple variations, of which two have been identified - E484Q and L452R. This new COVID-19 variant is said to be treatable and at present, the daily positivity rate is 0.04%.