Even if Covaxin formula shared, not many equipped to make it: Experts

Even if Covaxin formula shared, not many equipped to make it: Experts

Swati.Bharadwaj@timesgroup.com

Hyderabad:  16.05.2021 

After the loud chorus for vaccine maker Bharat Biotech to share its Covaxin "formula" prompted a top NITI Aayog official to invite interested vaccine makers to come forward, experts say very few players in the country are equipped to manufacture the inactivated virus vaccine.

That’s perhaps what also prompted Biocon’s founder chairperson Kiran Mazumdar-Shaw to tweet: “Vaccine Makers Invited To Produce Covaxin To Address Shortage -—interested to see how many takers there are.”

“Basically nobody actually wants to deal with or work with live viruses. In the rest of the world, nobody would dare to do it, that’s why most manufacturers go for protein-based vaccines. But in terms of the pandemic, the quickest way to develop a vaccine is to take the live virus and inactivate it,” says the honcho of a leading vaccine company.

Adds vaccine pioneer and Shantha Biotech founder KI Varaprasad Reddy: “Firstly, in a vaccine, there is no formula, its a process and technology. Even if others get it, they will take at least 6-8 months to a year to get acclimatized and start production, as validation of a high containment Bio-Safety Level-3 (BSL-3) facility alone would take 3-6 months. Also, training people to handle live viruses would require at least six months. It’s not a joke.”

Sources point out that even Indian Immunologicals Ltd, which will be manufacturing the Covaxin drug substance, will take at least three months to repurpose its BSL-2+ rabies facility and full-fledged production would begin only after October.

Others like Bharat Immunologicals & Biologicals as well as Haffkine Institute, roped in by the Indian government to make Covaxin, too, would take a few months to set up BSL-3 facilities.

Explaining the need for a BSL-3 facility to make Covaxin, Dr Rakesh K Mishra, former director and now adviser of Centre for Cellular and Molecular Biology (CCMB), points out that Covaxin requires a large-scale culture facility in a BSL-3 setup for growing live SARS-CoV-2 virus.

NOT AN EASY TASK