The All India Institute of Medical Science (AIIMS) is prepared to behind human trials today for the indigenous COVID-19 vaccine candidate, Covaxin, after being approved by its Ethics Committee on Saturday.
With a handful of volunteers already registered for the trial, individual screening of health condition prior to vaccinating would start on Monday, said Dr Sanjay Rai, Principal Investigator and Professor at the Centre for Community Medicine at AIIMS. Dr Rai added that the first dose of vaccine will probably be administered to volunteers on this Thursday.
Dr Balram Bhargava, Director-General of Indian Council for Medical Research (ICMR) in a letter to principal investigators of the 12 sites had asked them to fast-track the human clinical trial approvals.
The letter states, “It is one of the top priority projects which is being monitored at the top-most level of the government”. Hyderabad based pharma Bharat Biotech had recently been approved for human clinical trials from the Drugs Controller General Of India (DCGI), in collaboration with the ICMR and the National Institute of Virology (NIV). AIIMS in Delhi is scheduled to start phase I/II of human clinical trials of the indigenously developed Covid-19 vaccine candidate ‘Covaxin’ on Monday. AIIMS Delhi is among the 12 sites where human trials for Covaxin will be conducted.
All you need to know about AIIMS trials:
Any healthy individual who wishes to volunteer in the trial can send in an email on Ctaiims.covid19@gmail.com or send an SMS or call on 7428847499,” Dr Rai said, adding that in the first and second phase AIIMS (Delhi) will choose only 100 participants out of 375 volunteers and the remaining will participate at other sites.
1. It may be noted that there are 12 places where the trial for Covaxin is taking place as per the Indian Council for Medical Research (ICMR).
2. Covaxin underwent pre-clinical testing on animals to see if it is safe. “Results have been promising and show extensive safety and effective immune responses,” the company earlier said.
3. AIIMS human trials of Covaxin have begun in AIIMS-Patna with 10 chosen volunteers.

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