Inside India's Vaccine Ecosystem

A blow-by-blow account of how indian vaccines are being readied

- P.B. Jayakumar And Joe C. Mathew

THE BIG INVESTMENTS ON CORONA VACCINES

Serum Institute

₹2,100 crore

It plans to invest another ₹900 cr

Zydus Cadila

₹500 crore

Bharat Biotech

₹300-400 crore

When the first Corona cases surfaced during January and February in Kerala and Mumbai, it was an opportunity for scientists at the Indian Council of Medical Research (ICMR)’s National Institute of Virology (NIV) in Pune to study the virus. Professor Priya Abraham, a renowned pathologist and former head of department of Clinical Virology at Christian Medical College, Vellore, had taken over as the new NIV director a couple of months before. Abraham and her team isolated 11 strains of the virus, making India the fifth country after China, the US, Thailand and Japan to do so. Scientists realised the strains were 99.98 per cent similar to the virus then causing havoc in Wuhan. Vaccine development was a possibility. After completing characterisation, immunological biomarker studies and initial pre-clinical studies such as stability, they planned two animal studies. By March, the vaccine was injected in 20 monkeys and the results were 100 per cent sterilising immunity (the virus will not spread to others and within the body) without a single infection. The trial on Syrian Hamsters (a rodent used in trials because they can have similar viral infections in human) also proved 100 per cent immunity. Within two months, ICMR roped in Hyderabad-based Bharat Biotech as the technical partner and industry collaborator.