The Ministry of Science and Technology on Friday said that Zydus Cadila has received emergency use authorization (EUA) from the Drug Controller General of India (DCGI) for its ZyCoV-D vaccine. The is the world’s first and India’s indigenously developed DNA-based vaccine for Covid-19 and it will be administered to people for emergency use in adults and children aged 12 years and above. ZyCoV-D is a first of its kind DNA vaccine that produces the spike protein of the SARS-CoV-2 to elicit an immune response. It is an intradermal vaccine that has to be applied using a ‘needle-free injector’, which the manufacturer says will help in reducing side effects.ZyCov-D has been tested in phase 1, 2 and 3 clinical trials involving over 28,000 participants in all. A thousand of these participants were of ages between 12 and 18 years.
According to trial data so far, the vaccine has been able to bring down symptomatic cases of Covid-19 in those who received doses by nearly 67 per cent compared with those who did not get a vaccine. This is based on 79 to 90 RT-PCR confirmed cases of Covid-19 from those vaccinated in the phase 3 trials, Zydus Cadila managing director Dr Sharvil Patel said. Two doses of the vaccine seem to be enough to prevent people from developing severe symptoms of Covid-19 and to prevent death, while three doses keep even moderate symptoms at bay, according to trial data. If approved, ZyCoV-D will be India’s second indigenous coronavirus vaccine after Covaxin, and the sixth vaccine to be approved in the country so far, joining the leagues of Serum Institute's Covishield, Bharat Biotech's Covaxin, Russia's Sputnik V and the US-made Moderna and Johnson & Johnson.