COVID-19: India to help Bangladesh, Myanmar in developing and testing Coronavirus vaccine

Ministry of External Affairs (MEA) on Thursday said that it will use India's vaccine production and delivery capacity to help all humanity in fighting the COVID-19 pandemic. MEA also informed that India will expand its cooperation to Bangladesh and Myanmar.

Ministry of External Affairs Spokesperson Anuraj Srivastava, on a weekly virtual press briefing, said that in line with PM Modi's announcement at the United Nations General Assembly last month, India's Coronavirus vaccine production will help countries to enhance their cold chain and storage capacities. 

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India to help Myanmar & Bangladesh to fight against COVID

While responding to the question that many countries have requested India for COVID-19 vaccine cooperation, the External Affairs Ministry said that various cooperation and discussions of clinical trials of the vaccine are currently underway. It also informed that India has also come up with two training modules for its neighbouring countries. '90 health experts and scientists have participated in these two training modules,' it added. 

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Anuraj Srivastava said, "We propose to expand these programmes to other countries. With regards to discussions on clinical trials, there was a delegation which visited Bangladesh from October 17 to 19. There were discussions between the concerned departments and in these discussions, the current stage of vaccine development in India and the modalities of clinical trials in Bangladesh were discussed." 

MEA's Spokesperson said that earlier in the month, between October 17-19, an Indian delegation had visited Bangladesh. Srivastava informed that during this meeting, several discussions concerning vaccine development took place. He also said that the modalities of clinical trials in Bangladesh were also discussed in the meeting. 

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Speaking further, Srivastava said that India also held virtual discussions with the concerned officials of Myanmar. 'As the situation of the development of vaccine evolves, the two sides will discuss and decide modalities of cooperation,' he added. MEA said that depending upon the trials of the Coronavirus vaccine in India, it will expand its cooperation with other countries. 

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(With ANI inputs)