'Why is PM not taking vaccine?': Congress leader Rashid Alvi doubts efficacy of COVAXIN
On Saturday, Congress leader Rashid Alvi cast aspersions on the efficacy of COVAXIN amid the commencement of the pan-India COVID-19 vaccination drive in India.
- India News
- 3 min read
On Saturday, Congress leader Rashid Alvi cast aspersions on the efficacy of COVAXIN amid the commencement of the pan-India COVID-19 vaccination drive in the country. He mentioned that questions have been raised about the green signal to COVAXIN owing to the fact that its phase 3 efficacy data is not available. At this juncture, Alvi questioned Prime Minister Narendra Modi on why he was shying away from being administered the vaccine.
To buttress his point, he highlighted that the leaders of many other countries had taken the vaccine at the outset to bolster the people's confidence in the inoculation process. During his meeting with the Chief Ministers of all States on Monday, Modi stressed that the public representatives do not fall in the category of frontline workers and advised them to take the vaccine only when their turn comes. Moreover, Alvi contended that people should have the right to choose between COVISHIELD and COVAXIN.
COVID-19 vaccination begins in India
On January 3, the Drugs Controller General of India accepted the recommendations of the Subject Expert Committee of the Central Drugs Standard Control Organisation, paving way for the approval of COVISHIELD and COVAXIN. Manufactured by the Serum Institute of India with technology transfer from Oxford University-AstraZeneca, COVISHIELD is a Recombinant Chimpanzee Adenovirus vector vaccine with its overall efficacy of 70.42 per cent. On the other hand, COVAXIN is a Whole Virion Inactivated Corona Virus Vaccine developed by Bharat Biotech in collaboration with ICMR and NIV.
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It has been approved in "public interest" in the clinical trial mode so that there can be more options for vaccination in case of infection by mutant strains. Countering the charge that COVAXIN was approved hastily, Union Health Minister Dr. Harsh Vardhan has made it clear that all the recipients of this vaccine will be tracked and monitored as if they are in clinical trial mode. Earlier in the day, PM Modi launched the pan-India rollout of the novel coronavirus vaccination drive via video conferencing.
Congratulating the citizens for their resilient fight against the pandemic, he requested them to shun conspiracy theories about the vaccines. In a total of 3351 sessions held across India on Saturday, 1,91,181 beneficiaries were inoculated. Manish Kumar, a machine operator at AIIMS’ sanitation department, became the first person in the country to be administered the vaccine. BJP MP Dr. Mahesh Sharma, AIIMS Director Dr. Randeep Guleria and SII CEO Adar Poonawalla were among the prominent personalities to get inoculated.