Context India has approved two more COVID-19 vaccines and the antiviral drug Molnupiravir under emergency use authorisation.
Currently, India uses Covishield, Covaxin and Sputnik V for vaccination
Key takeaways
Vaccines recently approved in India are:
Corbevax, to be made by Hyderabad-based Biological E, is a protein subunit vaccine.
Covovax, to be manufactured by the Serum Institute of India, Pune, is a nanoparticle-based vaccine.
Covovax has been approved by the WHO under its Emergency Use Listing. It will be available globally as part of the COVAX initiative to ensure that at least 40% of world is vaccinated on priority.
Molnupiravir is said to be a promising drug for those with mild and moderate disease and also easily administered as a pill.
It has been approved under emergency use authorisation for treating adults with COVID-19 “who have high risk of progression to disease”.
Paxlovid is yet to be approved in India.
There are no studies so far to show how effective the new vaccines will be in giving protection against symptomatic infection when employed as a third dose.
