Every Indian aged 45 and above will be eligible to receive a COVID-19 vaccine as of April 1st, the Government has said. Government minister Prakash Javadekar briefed reporters on the development following a meeting of the Union Cabinet chaired by Prime Minister Narendra Modi. Javadekar urged vaccine uptake, stating “I urge all above the age […]
vaccines
AstraZeneca vaccine blood clots concerns addressed by Indian Government and WHO
Both the Indian government and the World Health Organization (WHO) have addressed recent concerns surrounding the Oxford University/AstraZeneca COVID-19 vaccine and blood clots. Recent days saw multiple nations in Europe suspend use of the vaccine in their inoculation programmes as a precautionary measure. France, Germany, Italy, and Spain are among the countries to have taken […]
Pharmacy of the world: Jaishankar touts India’s role in global medical supply
Subrahmanyam Jaishankar, the Union Minister of External Affairs, has touted India’s role as ‘pharmacy of the world’. Jaishankar highlighted the country’s role in exporting vital medicines and equipment, amidst the country’s growing role as an exporter of vaccines against COVID-19. “India could meet the spiking requirements of hydroxychloroquine, paracetamol and other relevant drugs across the […]
Global vaccine drive scaling up, but inequities remain
The global vaccination campaign against COVID-19 is scaling up. However, the vaccine drive continues to miss out many countries. Since the vaccine drive commenced in December, more than 345 million vaccine doses have been administered. India began its own vaccine drive in January and, as of Sunday, has administered 29.74 million doses. 24.31 million people […]
Vaccination campaign ramps up in India
India’s COVID-19 vaccination campaign has scaled up substantially in the last two days, a boon in the fight against the pandemic. Wednesday saw almost ten lakh shots administered and Thursday almost eleven lakh given out. This marks a significant increase from the recent average of approximately five lakh doses given out a day. The uptick […]
Covaxin shows promising results in trials
Covaxin, India’s homegrown COVID-19 vaccine candidate, has shown promising results in interim phase-III trials. The vaccine, manufactured by Hyderabad, Telangana-headquartered firm Bharat Biotech, demonstrated an almost 81 percent interim clinical efficacy according to the company following the release of results from the interim phase-III trials on Wednesday. “Covaxin demonstrates high clinical efficacy trend against COVID-19 […]
HPV awareness the need of the hour to fight cervical cancer
Today marks the culmination of the fourth International HPV Awareness Campaign, coinciding with International HPV Awareness Day. Raising awareness of HPV [the human papillomavirus] is essential in the fight against cancer – most prominently cervical cancer. As the World Health Organization (WHO) explains, “there are more than 100 types of HPV, of which at least […]
UN peacekeepers get vaccine boon from India
A spokesperson for United Nations (UN) Secretary-General António Guterres has expressed that the Secretary-General is “extremely grateful” after India granted UN peacekeepers 200,000 COVID-19 vaccine doses. Minister of External Affairs Subrahmanyam Jaishankar announced the gift during a meeting of the UN Security Council. India, Jaishankar said, has already supplied vaccines to 25 countries and anticipates […]
Vaccine stockpiling flagged by group
An anti-poverty advocacy group has flagged COVID-19 vaccine stockpiling by high-income countries in a new report. An analysis by the ONE Campaign, a movement which seeks to end poverty and preventable disease by 2030, said a cohort of wealthy nations had stockpiled more than a billion COVID-19 vaccine doses than required. The report examined contracts […]
Vaccine nationalism, vaccine diplomacy, and India
Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala, who will assume the role of director-general of the World Trade Organization (WTO) next month, has cast a spotlight on vaccine nationalism and warned that progress in combating COVID-19 will be hindered without equitable access to vaccines. Okonjo-Iweala, a Nigerian-American development economist, said “both on a human health basis, as well as an […]