The Serum Institute of India (SII), which has partnered with the University of Oxford, has started work on manufacturing a vaccine for coronavirus. The SII has started the work even as Oxford University on Thursday started clinical trials of the vaccine it has developed.
Once the clinical trials are over and successful, SII will release its vaccine. If the clinical trials by Oxford are not successful then the loss will be of SII. Some limited clinical trials will be done by SII also.
“SII will be manufacturing the vaccine in anticipation of clinical trials succeeding by September-October in the UK,” Adar Poonawalla, CEO, Serum Institute, said.
Currently, SII is awaiting regulatory approval from the government (ICMR and DBT) and once it gets the same, maybe in two weeks’ time, it expects to start production of 2-3 million doses by end of May, Poonawalla said.
Serum institute will be investing its own money for manufacturing the vaccine. Poonawalla, is hopeful of support from the government and from organisations such as the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation, for manufacturing the vaccines in the country.
The vaccine will be manufactured out of SII’s Pune plant where an existing plant has capability to handle the manufacture of this kind of a vaccine. If successful, the capacity to make the vaccine will be ramped up to 5 million doses by October and to 10 million doses six months later.