Working with Moderna to bring its Covid vaccine to India, says govt

The government said on Friday that it is working actively with COVID-19 vaccine manufacturer Moderna to see how its vaccine can be imported and made available in the country.

Moderna's COVID-19 vaccine was granted emergency use authorisation last month.

Responding to a question at a press briefing, NITI Aayog member (Health) Dr V K Paul said, "Moderna vaccine is under emergency use authorisation. The government is working actively with the manufacturers to see how to make this vaccine available in the country, importing it into the country, those efforts are on the process that has to be gone through is being actively pursued."

In response to another question on the vaccine of drug firm Zydus Cadila, Paul said the company had submitted its third phase trial results to the Drugs Controller General of India (DCGI) last week.

"Zydus Cadila has submitted its phase-3 trial results to the DCGI last week and scientific evidence is being probed and the process of exchange of information is actively going on," he said.

In this trial, Paul said children were also included and "we are hoping that after all this data gets evaluated through scientific process then recommendations will be followed, and if there is enough evidence to support vaccination by this vaccine for children between 12-18 years then that will also be provided at that time depending upon the robustness of the data and scientific evidence".

"We should wait for that process to be over and for a decision to be made by the scientific system in the DCGI," he said.