Tag Archives: #FightAgainstCorona

Education

Doctor’s Day


”The good physician treats the disease, the great physician treats the patients who has the disease”.

  • William Osler National Doctors’ Day is the day celebrated to acknowledge the contributions of physicians to individual lives and communities. The date might vary from nation to nation reckoning on the event of commemoration wont to mark the day. In some nations, the day is marked as a vacation. Though imagined to be celebrated by patients and benefactors of the healthcare organization it’s sometimes celebrated by health care organizations. Employees might organize a lunch for doctors to gift the physicians with tokens of recognition. Traditionally, a card or red carnation could also be sent to physicians and their spouses, alongside a flower being placed on the graves of deceased physicians.
    The very first time the Doctor’s Day was marked in March 1933 within the North American country state of Georgia. This day was celebrated by posting a card to the physicians and placing flowers on the graves of late doctors.
    In India, it’s celebrated on 1st July as a result of it’s the birth and death day of remembrance of Dr. Bidhan Chandra Roy (Dr. B C Roy), one amongst the foremost far-famed physicians of Republic of India who was also the 2nd Chief Minister of West Bengal.
    History of Doctor’s Day in India:
    National Doctor’s Day in India is well known for the memory of Dr. Bidhan Chandra Roy, the second Chief Minister of state and a legendary medical practitioner. He was born on Dominion Day, 1882 and died on a similar date in 1962, aged eighty years. He’s one in all the few folks in history to own obtained FRCS and MRCP degrees at the same time.

Dr. Roy was worthy of the country’s highest civilian award, Bharat Ratna, in april, 1961. The celebration of the Doctors’ Day is a lead to emphasize the worth of doctors in our lives and to supply them our respect and relentless services.

Doctor’s Day in Bharat was established by the govt. of India in 1991 to be recognized and celebrated every year . Doctor’s Day is ascertained on totally different dates across the globe. In the US it’s ascertained on the 30th of March, in Cuba on the 3rd of Dec and on the twenty 3rd of August in the Islamic Republic of Iran.
Doctor’s day 2020
The theme of this year’s Doctors Day is “Lessen the mortality of COVID 19”. This includes awareness regarding symptomless drive and early aggressive medical care. Because of the widespread of coronavirus, National Doctor’s Day celebration won’t embody face to face conferences and celebrations.
This day has special significance this year. Amid the COVID-19 pandemic, doctors and physicians all around the world are recognized for his or her self-sacrificing services and acts. Operating continuous shifts and putting their lives into risk. This day provides us an ideal chance to appreciate their work.
Doctors around the world in the frontline of the battle against coronavirus pandemic that has currently affected on the point of five thousand in India and has claimed 149 lives. With reports of para-medical employees and doctors getting infected by the coronavirus are coming up, the main focus has currently shifted to those brave souls.
The toil and dedication of the doctors since the beginning of the pandemic has been admirable. Also, this day jogs our memory to thank our doctors in providing us with selfless service and health facilities.

Thanking them for such a lot for what they create within the lives of their patients! Their kindness, sincerity caring nature, and concern build everything higher and furnish a good upliftment.

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Education

LOCKDOWN EFFECT: DOMESTIC VIOLENCE A RISE!!


Lockdown is helping every country to protect its citizens from spreading of Corona Virus. Due to which people are sitting idly at home for so long which is the main cause of an increase in domestic violence and child abuse. Most women and children are not feeling safe at their home because of domestic violence and child abuse. According to PTI report in the starting of Lockdown (March 20-31), they got over 92,000 SOS calls from the ‘CHILDREN HELPLINE NO. – 1098’ from across the country for the protection of their children from child abuse. National Commission for Women (NCW) got 315 complaints from across the country in April reported another source. The complaints in NCW faced a surge of more than 50% calls regarding domestic violence than in the normal days.
The reason behind the increase in domestic violence
Domestic violence is not an option if you are frustrated. When the abuser feels hopeless and not able to control the things in other aspects of life he chooses domestic violence as an option to reduce his stress. According to Psychologist Schita Sethi “, the victim is in front of their eyes. It becomes even more acceptable to them to commit such acts” also she expresses her views on child abuse by saying “the younger ones will find it tough to understand and express their situation, while older ones will experience guilt, shame and anger”

Not just there is an increase in the domestic violence but women are also facing marital rape as well on this Poonam Muttreja, executive director of NGO population foundation of India said “not just in India, any kind of health disaster leads to increased violence, across the world, against women and children. Therefore I’d like to request our government and women commission to look at global trend, and let’s get ready for the response now, as the vaccine is many months away” also after liquor shops opened there was an increase in the no. of domestic violence and also because of lockdown women and children are forced to live with the abuser they cannot leave the house or not able to seek the help.
Due to domestic violence and children abuse, victims are going through physical and emotional breakdown as well many victims are suffering from depression, anxiety as they are not left with any option their life is getting miserable day by day and as days are passing abuser are getting uncontrollable.

How can a victim come out of this?
One of the senior police officers shared that victim can inform about domestic violence and child abuse in the police station of their area. Not only this but they can also send SOS message to Crime Against Women or through email, handwritten copy, or they can fax them and victim’s message will be directly sent to women commission or Chief Minister’s office and from there it will go to DCP and get recorded in women’s cell. A similar process is being followed with the regards to child abuseabuse, but a different unit is assigned to look after these cases.
NCW has launched a WhatsApp no. “7217735372” for filling the report against domestic violence.

Law and Order, News

HERE IS WHY THE PANDEMIC IS GETTING MORE DIFFICULT TO PREDICT AND TRACK

Predictions on covid-19 are growing extremely complicated as the number of cases continues to increase across regions as India entered Unlock 2.0 on Wednesday, the government and scientists have reported.

The pandemic curve has been relatively confined and is starting to flatten since the strict 70-day shutdown implemented on 25 March, yet legislators remain mindful of the resulting increase in cases. States like Kerala succeeded in taking down the count of cases during the lockout but the easing of constraints contributed to a second surge. The condition is such that any covid-19 pandemic forecast may be inaccurate, state health experts said.

“The infection was imported and located in urban areas with a concentration in metros in the first two months, but has now moved to peripheral districts and small cities. This movement has given an impression that cases are decreasing in some areas, while in others there is a surge in cases. However, this is about the movement of infections and population,” said Dr Jugal Kishore, professor and head, department of community medicine, Safdarjung Hospital.

Delhi has the highest case load among cities with more than 87,000 cases. “We have increased testing in Delhi. Initially, on testing 100 people, around 31 were found to be positive and today only 13 out of 100 people were found to be positive. These things show that the situation is under control and is not as terrible as it was one month back. However, we have to be cautious,” said chief minister Arvind Kejriwal.

Over the past week, Delhi has been reporting more than 2,000 cases daily. “Delhi’s fixed population is showing less cases for 3-4 days, but new cases will continue because a large number of the Delhi population is floating,” said Kishore.

In all major states affected with covid-19 , Karnataka has also seen a significant increase since it opened its frontiers. In the last two weeks, however, the number of local infections has also increased, indicating the possibility of community spread. The number of cases has risen dramatically in Bengaluru, raising concerns of yet another lockout in the state capital.

Karnataka has now crossed the 15,000 covid-19 case threshold ahead of expectations, and by mid-August at least 25,000 cases are now expected. The state government has asked doctors to be prepared mentally to continue the struggle for another six months.

Health experts said the number of cases will increase because of the onset of the monsoon, which is also a season for influenza. “There will be a greater number of covid-19 cases as the influenza season will come. There will be a double problem. The cases that we are seeing now are reservoirs of the lockdown. Soon after the movement started, the cases also started increasing. We will see a further increase. The disease continues to be unpredictable,” said Lalit Kant, a scientist and former head of epidemiology and communicable diseases at ICMR.

India’s recovery rate improved to 59.43%. “During the last 24 hours, 13,157 covid-19 patients have been cured, taking the cumulative figure to 357,612. Presently, there are 226,555 active cases and all are under medical supervision,” the Union health ministry said. As on Wednesday, India recorded 601,952 covid-19 cases, with 17,785 deaths.

Source:https://www.livemint.com/news/india/pandemic-s-spread-is-getting-tricky-to-predict-says-govt-11593656412642.html

News, Public Administration

SHAILAJA TEACHER: corona virus slayer

Kerala, which recorded India’s first three corona virus cases,has been successful in flattening the curve of new infections. The southern state has reported 3,451 cases, of which 1809 patients were discharged after receiving treatment . Twenty-two deaths have been recorded so far in Kerala.

Kerala Health Minister KK Shailaja popularly known as Shailaja Teacher has been hailed for effectively control the Covid-19 curve in the state , at a time when the entire country was devasted by the disease. Kerala was apparently successful to fight with the virus because of timely intervention by the Minister.

Recently she was honoured by the United Nations during the celebration of Public Service Day for tackling the Covid-19 pandemic Effectively .The UN observed Public Service Day on 23 rd June to honour those who risking their life and health to deliver essential public services amid the ongoing Covid-19 pandemic.

K.K SHAILAJA attending UN Public Service Day Celebration

the event was held at virtual platform and saw the digital participatation of UN secretary General Antonio Guterres and other top dignitaries

Public Administration, Social Studies

Health facilities in life support

There is constant fear among the frontline health workers in India that the system is under severe stress and can crumble anytime in the middle of the covid-19 pandemic. India is a country that spends just over 1% of its GDP in health infrastructure. Hundreds of people lining up from different parts of the country outside hospitals like AIIMS, RML, GTB etc. is testament to our governments failing to provide affordable basic healthcare facilities to people. Even before the pandemic hit the country, there was 82% shortage of specialists and professionals in all government hospitals. Same goes for lab technicians, nurses and pharmacists.

Now, the covid-19 pandemic has tested and even defeated the health facilities of countries that provide the best healthcare in the world. Even in countries like Italy, Spain, United States and France; hospitals were continuously running out of staff, beds, oxygen cylinders, ventilators, medicines and many other essentials. There was a severe shortage of doctors, nurses and other medical staff to attend the admitted patients and then treatment was eventually handed out in priority basis.

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Wedding halls in Delhi being converted into corona isolation wards

Now consider the nightmare scenario India is currently in. Already the number of positive cases are rising exponentially with no signs of slowing down or even flattening. The ICUs and general wards of Delhi and Mumbai hospitals are almost full. Patients are being denied admission and treatment even for the most serious cases.  There are harrowing reports of people struggling to get a hospital bed including many grieving relatives saying that their loved ones died at the doorsteps of hospitals. In some cases, people even visited 6-7 hospitals and were still denied admission citing non availability of beds.

Nearly 70% beds vacant in COVID-19 hospitals run by Delhi govt, private facilities almost full
Patients waiting for their admission in a hospital in Delhi

And the misery persists even after death. Dozens of grieving men and women keep waiting outside hospitals throughout the day to identify the bodies of their loved ones who died due to COVID-19. Bodies are pilling up in hospital wards. There are chilling visuals of dead bodies left unattended by the hospital staff along with the patients. The relatives are handed over wrong bodies and patients are dangling out of their beds. These sights are becoming increasingly common in government hospitals all across the country.

After receiving hundreds of public interest litigations and taking suo moto cognizance after looking at numerous reports of gross violations of human rights, the high courts and the Supreme Court have come down heavily on central and state governments. The Supreme Court said that the situation is “horrendous” with respect to the handling of Covid-19 patients in Delhi, the capital city, and that the patients are being treated “worse than animals”. The court also slammed the Delhi government on mishandling of the situation and asked them why do the patients have to undergo such pathetic conditions in the hospitals. The situation is more or less the same in the rest of the country too. In Maharashtra, the state which has the maximum number of coronavirus cases, the high court had to direct the government to conduct more tests and increase the number of beds. Many doctors and health experts have said that Mumbai, the financial capital of India, has less than 30 ICU beds remaining.

Business and Management

luxury food industry amasses heavy losses due to the virus

Global demand for luxury foods such as wagyu beef, bluefin tuna and caviar has plummeted into decline in the wake of the coronavirus pandemic, with thousands of restaurants shuttered.

The luxury food industry may be among the hardest affected because it depends heavily on restaurants and top hotels for ordering deluxe goods from caviar to champagne, because tight shutdown efforts to curb the epidemic ravage global economic activity. While some gourmet food manufacturers are specifically targeting customers to remain alive, some have been compelled to slash production since some goods have lost nearly half their value since the beginning of the year.

Jean-Marie Barillere, co-chairman of champagne producers’ lobby CIVC in France, said he hoped people would celebrate the easing of lockdown with a bottle of champagne, but expected a difficult end to the year. “This is really a period that looks like a war time,” he said.

Bookings data compiled by OpenTable, an online restaurant reservation service, showed this year a decline of nearly 80 percent year-on-year in seated restaurants in the United States, UK , Germany, Canada , Australia, Ireland and Mexico. Restaurants is among the world’s hardest-hit industries

“People will not want to taste a Chateau Petrus wine, a lobster or caviar under a bell jar,” said Michel Berthommier, managing director of Caviar Perlita in southwestern France. “If you force people to eat in these conditions they will prefer going to fast foods.”

Premium foods was “one of the worst hit sectors worldwide”, said Ole Houe, director of advisory services at agriculture brokerage IKON Commodities in Sydney. He said he did not expect a prompt recovery given many countries were in recession. Falling demand has already taken a toll on the prices of luxury items.

In Tokyo, the price of top-quality wagyu beef cuts fell around 30% from a year ago, bluefin tuna – deemed the best in Japan – fell more than 40% during that period, while Shizuoka’s popular ‘Earl’s melons’ prices dropped 30%. Russia’s largest breeding sturgeon business-Russian Caviar Shop-meanwhile gave Beluga hybrid caviar a 30 per cent discount.

“Spring and summer are always low seasons for the caviar market, but if we compare this period with previous years, the sales in Russia are down 50%,” said the firm’s owner Alexander Novikov.

In France, caviar prices languished near historic lows, champagne sales tumbled, while foie gras producers have had to cut output to prop up prices. Cifog, a foie gras producers’ group, said restaurants account for 40% of total foie gras sales. “Mid-March it felt like the sky had fallen on us,” said Florian Boucherie, who produces 2 tonnes of foie gras per year in France.

To plug the yawning gap left by eateries, many high-end food producers are attempting to reach consumers directly via e-commerce platforms. Others are steering more produce onto supermarket shelves. “We are accelerating our supply of products into some of the world’s largest supermarkets, gourmet butchers and direct to consumers online,” said Hugh Killen, chief executive of Australia’s largest listed beef producer, Australian Agricultural Company.

In Japan, top sushi chefs pay 400,000 yen ($3,737.97) for 10kg of the best cuts of tuna compared to the 25,000 yen paid by supermarkets for 10kg of lower value cuts, said Yukitaka Yamaguchi, owner of Yamayuki tuna brokerage at Toyosu Market in Tokyo. He said “the best part of (the) tuna” was usually sold first to high-end sushi restaurants but when these closed the “harakami had nowhere to go.” They eventually started offering high-quality tuna to fish retailers and supermarkets. For now, Yamaguchi has had to park plans to retire as he has accumulated debt during the pandemic. “I had planned to retire when I turn 60, but that’s no longer possible,” he said.

Source:https://in.reuters.com/article/health-corononavirus-food-premium/luxury-food-industry-turns-sour-amid-global-coronavirus-lockdowns-idINKBN23J0SR

Business and Management

Spike in household savings expected due to covid-19

Due to forced slowdown in COVID-related consumption household savings are expected to spike in Q1’20-21. This will come in handy to finance the economy’s recovery, an RBI research paper said as it is the Indian economy’s most reliable and self-reliant source of capital.

In this time of layoffs and the economy is absolute turmoil, this research comes as a beacon of hope.In India, as compared t other countries saving has been considered very important, especially by middle-class families.Due to our mindset and traditional values saving has always been preferred over spending . In fact consumerism came very late to India in comparison with other countries that achieved independence from colonial powers around the same time that we did.A lot can be attributed to the fact that the standard of living in our country had been stagnant for a very long period of time.

Only in the last decade or two, the standard of living of masses have some how increased, this can be mainly attributed to increase in the country’s overall literacy rate, for both men as well as women and also rapid infrastructural development that we have witnessed since the turn of the century.One of the many policies of this government that played a major role in this would be the 1990 Economic Policies, this particular policy has drastically changed the prevalent economic structure of the country.One of the important implementations of the policy was the opening up of the country’s economy and integrating ourselves with the world economy.This created a healthy competition in the economy which motivated Indian firms to increase the quality of their product to be at par international standards

A spike in households’ net financial assets is likely due to a sharp drop in lockdown-induced consumption in the first quarter of 2020–21. According to the paper written by Anupam Prakash, Anand Prakash Ekka, Kunal Priyadarshi, Chaitali Bhowmick and Ishu Thakur of the RBI Department of Economic and Policy Research, several studies show that households tend to save more during a slowdown and income uncertainty.

After the nationwide lock-down to combat the COVID-19 pandemic, economists forecast an ever worse contraction of the Indian economy during FY’21. The paper also warns that lags in the pickup of economic activity may cause households’ financial surplus in subsequent quarters to taper off. With construction activity at a standstill, households are likely to move from physical assets such as residential property to financial assets such as deposits, currency, and mutual funds, and are more useful in financing businesses and the growth of the economy. At Rs 15.6 lakh crore, India’s net financial savings rose to 7.7 per cent in FY’20 as of March 2020 from 7.2 per cent in FY’19.

For the Indian economy, the report notes, the household sector is the most sustainable and self-reliant source of finance. In the light of the policy initiative gathering critical mass to lift the Indian economy from the vice-like grip of a recession and, more recently, the life-threatening COVID-19 pandemic, it said, its position is likely to become crucial.

The Indian households hold financial assets or financial savings in currency, bank deposits, debt securities, mutual funds, insurance , pension funds and small savings. Currency and bank deposits accounted for 66 per cent of overall financial assets, led by pension companies and mutual funds contributing 30.2 per cent respectively. Such in-turns are strong sources of company financing.

Source:https://economictimes.indiatimes.com/news/economy/finance/covid-related-consumption-crunch-may-spike-q1-household-savings/articleshow/76322161.cms

Science and Technology

Johnson & Johnson to start human trails for covid-19 vaccine in july

Johnson & Johnson has decided to move up it’s clinical trials by two months, from September to July, says the company as the pharmaceutical giant , like many others expects to be the first, in the race of creating ‘the’ vaccine,i.e COVID -19 vaccine.

The speeding up of the process will allow J&J to participate in the U.S. government’s proposed major clinical trials project which targets to provide an successful vaccine by the end of the year. In March, J&J signed agreements with the U.S. government to build adequate production resources to manufacture more than 1 billion doses of its vaccine by 2021, even before it has confirmation that the vaccine will be effective.

There are currently no recognized medications or vaccines approved for the virus in the USA. A vaccination is seen as necessary to end the pandemic that has affected more than 7.2 million people and killed more than 412,000 people across the globe and has also had an adverse affect on the several economies around the world .

“Based on the strength of the pre-clinical data we have seen so far and interactions with the regulatory authorities, we have been able to further accelerate the clinical development,”Chief Scientific Officer Paul Stoffels of J&J said in a statement on Wednesday.

The trails by J&J will test the vaccine for safe operation and early signs of effectiveness in 1,045 healthy volunteers aged 18 to 55, and in those aged 65 and older. The trial will take place in the United States and Belgium.

The firm is also in discussions with the National Institutes of Allergy and Infectious Diseases (NIAID) to begin bigger, late-stage studies before time, based on early research outcomes and regulatory clearance.

The United States plans to study a number of participants for the coronavirus vaccine in studies that would involve up to 30,000 people and get a potency result as soon as possible.  Health Chief of National Institutes Dr Francis Collins said.

Stoffels said last week that J&J hopes to have results of its vaccine efficacy trials in the first quarter of 2021. He added that the company is “working hard to bring it back to the end of the year.” A lot will depend on how much virus is circulating at that time, he said.

The company plans to test the vaccine in high-transmission regions within the United States. If the incidence is low, “we will complement that with international sites to make sure that we reach enough endpoints quickly to prove the vaccine works,” Stoffels said.

Moderna Inc, which is working in close partnership with NIAID, has started testing its vaccine candidate in a 600-subject mid-stage trial. The company expects to begin late-stage trials in July.

Moderna’s vaccine uses messenger RNA technology, an approach that has yet to produce any approved vaccines. J&J is utilizing the same technology used to make its Ebola vaccine, which won European regulatory approval late last month.

The trick with developing a vaccine is that it has to be widely tested and developed in a format that is effective on everyone and thus, can be mass-produced , so that the vaccine is profitable for the company manufacturing it too.

There are about 10 coronavirus vaccines in human testing. Experts have said a safe and effective vaccine could take at least 12 to 18 months from the start of development, which would shave several years off the typical vaccine development timeline.

Source:https://www.reuters.com/article/us-health-coronavirus-johnson-johnson/jj-to-begin-human-trials-of-covid-19-vaccine-in-second-half-of-july-idUSKBN23H24F?utm_campaign=fullarticle&utm_medium=referral&utm_source=inshorts

Business and Management

3 months given to unlisted bond issuers in debt funds to list by sebi

India’s Securities and Exchange Board (Sebi) has issued unlisted non-convertible debentures (NCDs), where mutual funds are mostly the investors, a three-month one-time window for listing has been allocated to such schemes.

A letter was sent to asset management companies late Tuesday, acoording to SEBI, stating that , starting June 15, a window would be made available to issuers who have outstanding unlisted NCDs as of March 31 without having to comply to the requirement and the guidelines on the electronic bidding platform. Mutual funds are however required to keep issuers informed of this window.

According to a copy of the letter with LiveMint , the letter stated “This is another step towards ensuring that debt mutual fund schemes hold only 10% in unlisted debt. Mutual funds have time till end of December to comply with the norms. The existing unlisted remains grandfathered. The listing would entail higher compliance and disclosures.”

The schemes had to meet the investment limits for non-listed non-convertible debentures (NCDs) at 15 percent and 10 percent of the debt portfolio by 31 March and 30 June respectively. These dates were subsequently extended to 30 September and 31 December respectively due to COVID-19 related disruptions. This additional move is to have liquidity for certain papers that are not listed. Exchanges require for the listing of fresh NCDs and not current unlisted ones, said asset management company’s CEO.

“In addition, it permitted mutual funds to grandfather the existing investments in unlisted debt instruments till maturity of such instruments, so as to not disrupt the market,” said Sebi.

According to Sebi communication, if issuers of non-listed NCDs take advantage of the opportunity of one-time listing and submit their application for listing but unduly delay in getting their NCDs listed, they would be required to pay additional 1 percent coupon to investors. On Wednesday the Asset Management Companies (AMCs) were advised by the Association of Mutual Funds in India (AMFI) that they would take full advantage of the opportunity and act immediately.

“There are about 121 companies which haven’t listed their debs. Franklin Templeton is the largest owner of unlisted debts among mutual fund houses. We will request all of invester companies to list their debts,” said the CEO of a large fund house, anonymously.

MF industry holds about 41,500 crore of non-listed NCDs in all schemes, excluding liquid schemes as of March 31. The six debt schemes that are under the winding-up process hold a large chunk of these unlisted debts. Many of these NCDs are issued and used to be considered liquid investments by marquee issuers. Those have been illiquid in the new covid-19 scenario due to market uncertainty, raising problems for the mutual funds.

“Further, some of the same issuers’ listed NCDs issued after 1 October trade regularly, but the unlisted NCD of the same issuer with the same rating and potentially a shorter maturity has become completely liquid. This has been adversely impacting the performance of various mutual fund schemes investing in debt instruments,” said an AMFI member.

“While Sebi has facilitated listing of unlisted NCDs many marquee issuers such as Tata Sons are unwilling to list their bonds. Perhaps they would make up the 10% of the unlisted debt still allowed,” said an official of a fund house.

Source:https://www.livemint.com/news/india/sebi-gives-3-months-to-unlisted-bond-issuers-in-debt-funds-to-list-11591790405023.html

Business and Management, Science and Technology

world’s largest vaccine manufacturer invests usd 100 million to develop potential Covid-19 vaccine

According to a company official of , the world’s largest producer of vaccines, the Serum Institute of India , is planning to invest USD 100 million on a potential vaccine for COVID-19,  being developed at Oxford University. The organization established in Pune, has collaborated with AstraZeneca, a British bio-pharmaceutical corporation mammoth, to ensure a stable supply to India and other low- and middle-income countries of the AZD1222 vaccines.

“Our manufacturing facility is ready and we plan to start production in two months. We are spending more than USD 100 million for this facility. Till the trials are completed successfully for safety and efficacy, vaccines will not be distributed either in India or anywhere else in the world,” Adar Poonawalla, Chief Executive Officer, Serum Institute of India (SII), said.

With high hopes the company is planning to mass produce up to a million units, and is planning to stockpile the same at personal risk. According to the company when it comes to determine how many units India is likely to get in the first phase, they commented that it might be too early too comment. “However, if the vaccine trials succeed, India will gain access to the doses as it will also be the requirement of the Government of India. And we are certain that everybody will respect if the substantial volumes go to India,” he added.

According to their website, Serum Institute of India was founded in 1966 by Dr. Cyrus Poonawalla with the aim of manufacturing life-saving immuno-biologicals, which were in shortage in the country and imported at high prices. Thereafter, several life-saving biologicals were manufactured at prices affordable, and now is the world’s largest vaccine manufacturer by number of doses produced and sold globally (more than 1.5 billion doses) which includes Polio vaccine as well as Diphtheria, Tetanus, Pertussis, Hib, BCG, r-Hepatitis B, Measles, Mumps and Rubella vaccines. It is estimated that about 65% of the children in the world receive at least one vaccine manufactured by Serum Institute. Vaccines manufactured by the Serum Institute are accredited by the World Health Organization, Geneva and are being used in around 170 countries across the globe in their national immunization programs, saving millions of lives throughout the world.

Serum Institute of India is ranked as India’s No. 1 biotechnology company, manufacturing highly specialized life saving biologicals like vaccines using cutting edge genetic and cell based technologies, antisera and other medical specialties.

Serum Institute of India also has plans and is working on developing a vaccine with USA based firm Codagenix, Poonawalla recently said that at present, the firm is undergoing pre-clinical trials (animal trial phase) and hope to progress to the human trial phase by September/October.

“The aim is to make the vaccine over the next 1.5-2 years to help combat the novel corona-virus. With the combined efforts of our partner Codagenix, we are optimistic that we will be able to provide a viable and effective vaccine for mass use,” Adar Poonawalla, Chief Executive Officer, Serum Institute of India (SII), said.

SII along with Oxford and Codagenix is also working with an Austria-based firm, Themis and two other promising candidates to develop an effective and affordable vaccine for COVID-19.At least half a dozen attempts to build a coronavirus vaccine are underway worldwide but the ones in Oxford are considered one of the most assuring and promising ones.   A vaccine will be a much needed intervention that can bring the loss of lives caused by the infections, to a complete halt.

Source:https://economictimes.indiatimes.com/industry/healthcare/biotech/pharmaceuticals/serum-institute-investing-usd-100-million-on-potential-covid-19-vaccine/articleshow/76288408