India won't fix benchmark for selecting potential Covid-19 vaccine: Report

As the race to find the coronavirus vaccine continues, India on Thursday said that it would not be following the existing benchmark for vaccine selection and would explore all options for mass immunisation against Covid-19, Mint reported.

The novel coronavirus has killed more than 53,000 people, while the total infections in the country mounted past 28 lakh.

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The news report quotes Central government officials saying that the government was considering benchmarks like cost, ease of administration and efficiency to determine the vaccine candidate.

“Of course, if it has an efficacy rate of 10%, we will not accept it, and maybe 90% (efficacy) will be difficult (to achieve)," Dr V.K. Paul, NITI Aayog member (health), and the chairman of the National Expert Group on Vaccine Administration told LiveMint.

The vaccine administration group is responsible for setting up the logistics and financial infrastructure to roll out the vaccination drive when a vaccine candidate gets approval for mass administration.

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India's process of selecting a vaccine differs from the United States or the United Kingdom. Right now, in the country, there are 4 domestic vaccine manufacturers - Serum Institute of India, Pune; Bharat Biotech, Hyderabad; Zydus Cadila, Ahmedabad; Gennova Biopharmaceuticals, Pune; and Biological E, Hyderabad.

India's Covid-19 caseload went past 28 lakh with a record single-day spike of 69,652 infections, while the recoveries increased to 20,96,664 on Thursday pushing the recovery rate to 73.91 per cent. There are 6,86,395 active cases of coronavirus infection in the country which is 24.20 per cent of the total caseload