The Covid surge is back in China but many are still hesitant to take the booster shot.
Soon, a nasal Covid vaccine will also be available in the markets.
The nasal vaccine is currently available on the CoWIN website and it will be out in the market by January-end.
Bharat Biotech International Ltd. on Tuesday said its COVID-19 intranasal vaccine iNCOVACC, which is available on CoWIN portal, is priced at Rs 800 for private markets and Rs 325 for government supplies. The prices are excluding the GST.
Bharat Biotech’s needle-free vaccine – BBV154 – received approval from the Drugs Controller General of India in November for restricted use in emergencies for those above 18. The vaccine has been approved for mix-and-match usage (or heterologous vaccination), wherein a beneficiary may be administered shots of different Covid vaccines. Earlier this month, it was approved as a heterologous booster dose.
The vaccine, iNCOVACC, is the world’s first intranasal vaccine for Covid to receive approval for the preliminary 2-dose schedule, the Hyderabad-based company had said.
The pharma giant’s executive chairman Dr Krishna Ella said, “We have achieved the goals we set for ourselves during this pandemic. We have developed COVAXIN and iNCOVACC, two COVID vaccines from two different platforms with two other delivery systems.”
The trials for the primary dose were conducted among 3,100 subjects in 14 trial sites across the country, while the heterologous booster dose was done at nine trial sites among 875 subjects. iNCOVACC is stable at 2-8°C for easy storage and distribution. Bharat Biotech has established extensive manufacturing capabilities at multiple sites across India, including in Gujarat, Karnataka, Maharashtra and Telangana.
