JOIN USUddhav Thackeray reiterates demand for Covid-19 vaccine production in Haffkine
Amid the pan-India vaccine shortage, Maharashtra chief minister Uddhav Thackeray reiterated the request to allow the Mumbai-based Haffkine Institute to produce the Covid-19 vaccine.
Thackeray once again, during the video-conference meeting, urged prime minister Narendra Modi to clear the proposal for vaccine production at Haffkine. “The Haffkine Institute can produce 22.8 crore vaccine doses a year,” Thackeray said.
The Maharashtra government is keen that Bharat Biotech, which is producing Covaxin, enters an agreement with the state to enhance production. The state has proposed that in the Haffkine Institute, vaccines can be produced by way of technology transfer or fill-and-finish basis.
The Haffkine Institute was established in 1899 and is named after the legendary scientist Dr. Waldemar Mordecai Haffkine who invented the plague vaccine. Since then, Haffkine Institute has emerged as a multi-disciplinary institute engaged in training, research and testing of various aspects of infectious diseases.
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The first-ever Phase-I clinical trial in India was perhaps conducted by the founder of the Haffline Institute in 1899, when he injected himself with the plague vaccine he developed for evaluating its safety and efficacy.
In the first half of the twentieth century, the Institute extended its scope against various other common infectious diseases – like Cholera, Tetanus, Diphtheria, Pertussis and Rabies.
The institute also developed and manufactured Anti-rabies serum and anti-snake-venom serum.
Later on, it undertook the production of Oral Polio Vaccine.
The current research areas in the Haffkine Institute include studies of infections occurring in AIDS patients, surveillance and microbiological analysis of brucellosis, leptospira, the prevalence of drug resistance in bacteria, and continuous development of newer chemotherapeutic agents to combat microbial and zoonotic infections.