Tag: COVID-19 pandemic

Production Of Cervical Cancer

Production Of Cervical Cancer To Start In 2023: Poonawala

By LokMarg

The production of India’s first indigenously developed quadrivalent Human Papillomavirus (HPV) “CERVAVAC” vaccine, for the prevention of cervical cancer, by the Serum Institute of India will start in the first quarter of 2023 which got delayed due to COVID-19 pandemic, said SII CEO Adar Poonawala on Friday.

t indigenously developed vaccine, “CERVAVAC” was announced for the prevention of cervical cancer.
“The capacity got delayed by one year because we are using a new building to this. We use the original HPV vaccine building for Covovax. So, we have to, at that time, had no choice during the pandemic and you know, there are many vaccines like dengue and so many other developments that were deferred by two years for this,” Poonawala said.

On the export of HPV vaccines to other countries he said, “We have already submitted the files and once that is done, we can then export in 2024 to UNICEF, Gavi and the African countries also because there was a shortage of HPV vaccine for the last few years.”

He further said the Drugs Controller General of India (DCGI) has already given a license to the vaccine.

“We will scale up beyond that to reach about 150 million doses or so because eventually I think the Indian immunisation programme will also take a substantial amount and that will also take time to scale up. So, we are matching our scale-up with the demand to satisfy India and its requirements. We are just one year later than what I would have wanted to be in terms of our capacity. We are already licensed by the DCGI,” he said.

On the production of HPV vaccine in 2023, the SII CEO further said that about one or 2 million doses per month will be supplied to the government.

“We will be making a very small quantity and launching it in the Indian government programme in first quarter of next year and followed by having a capacity of 70 million doses which can go up to 150 to 200 million doses the year after that, so to be clear, in 2023, will have a capacity of maybe around 20 million doses. So that’s about one or 2 million doses per month that will be supplied to the government followed by which we will get it who requalification hopefully with all the data that will present,” said Adar Poonawala on production of HPV vaccine in 2023.

Earlier, Adar Poonawala said that HPV vaccine will be available at an affordable price, “We will announce the price in a few months, it’ll be approx Rs 200-400. We will finalise after manufacturing and discussion with the Government of India.”

Union Minister Dr Jitendra Singh was present as a Chief guest on the occasion where India’s first indigenously developed vaccine, “CERVAVAC” was announced for the prevention of cervical cancer.

“India has come out with the first indigenously developed vaccine for cervical cancer, prevalent among women of the younger age group. Thanks to PM we can now afford to look for preventive healthcare. This vaccine will be affordable,” said Singh.

‘CERVAVAC’ is an outcome of a partnership of DBT and BIRAC with the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation, supported by Serum Institute of India Private Limited for the indigenous development of quadrivalent vaccine through its partnership program ‘Grand Challenges India’. (ANI)

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Covid cases in last 24 hours

India Issues Advisory For Students Planning To Study In China

By LokMarg

India has issued a detailed advisory related to studying at Chinese medical schools as thousands of enrolled students continue to remain stuck at home amid the COVID-19 pandemic.

More than 23,000 Indian students enrolled in various Chinese universities have been affected by the Chinese visa ban.
“Embassy of India in Beijing has been receiving several queries from prospective Indian students and their parents with respect to seeking admission for undergraduate clinical medicine programme in China,” the embassy said in a statement on September 8.

China in July said that the country has made progress on facilitating the return of Indian students and is working in tandem with relevant departments to see that the first batch of Indian students can come back to study in China at the earliest.

The Indian Embassy also shared the link to a study conducted by the National Board of Examination to highlight that only 6387 out of 40,417 students, who appeared in the FMG Examination from 2015 to 2021 have cleared it.

“The study shows that only 6387 out of 40,417 students, who appeared in FMG Examination from 2015 to 2021 have cleared it. Here, the pass percentage of Indian students who have studied clinical medicine programme in China in that period in these 45 universities was only 16 per cent,” it statement further added.

Indian students pursuing medicine from Chinese Universities are unable to return to China to attend classes due to COVID-19-induced restrictions.

Earlier, External Affairs Minister S Jaishankar in his meeting with Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi on the sidelines of the G20 Foreign Ministers’ Meeting also stressed the need for expediting the process of return of Indian students to China to attend classes at an early date.

In order to facilitate the return of Indian students, Jaishankar met with Wang Yi on March 25.

Earlier in April, the Chinese side had expressed its willingness to consider facilitating the return of Indian students to China on a need-assessed basis, said the Indian Embassy in China. (ANI)