Indian drugmaker Zydus Cadila has applied to the Central Drugs Standard Control Organisation (CDSCO) for emergency use approval of its Covid-19 vaccine, which showed a 66.6 per cent efficacy against corona cases in a meantime analysis. The candidate would become India’s second successful home-grown Covid-19 vaccine if approved and help ease the country’s severe vaccine shortage. Coronavirus cases in India have dropped from a destructive peak in April and May. However, experts warned of a third wave and repeated that only vaccination remains the best defence against the coronavirus pandemic.

Zydus said that the vaccine, a three-course regimen, showed safety and efficacy in a late-stage trial with more than 28,000 volunteers across the country, including about 1,000 subjects in the 12-18-year age group. The drugmaker said it is also assessing a two-dose regimen for the shot. “This will further help in reducing the full-course duration of vaccination,” the drugmaker said, adding that it plans to manufacture up to 120 million doses of the vaccine annually.

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Approval for the vaccine, ZyCoV-D, would make it the sixth vaccine authorised for use in India. The country has already approved vaccines from Moderna, AstraZeneca, Covaxin, Covishield, and Russia’s Sputnik V. Zydus said the study was carried out “during the peak of the second wave of Covid-19” in India and confirmed the vaccine’s efficacy against new mutant variants, especially, the Delta variant.