A subject expert committee of India’s drug regulator on Friday recommended granting emergency use authorisation to coronavirus vaccine Covovax for children aged between 7 years and 11 years. The recommendation has been sent to the Drugs Controller General of India for final approval.
If approved, Corbevax would be the third vaccine available in India for children under the age of 12. In April, the drug regulator had cleared the use of Covaxin for children aged between 6 and 12, Corbevax for the 5-12 age group. The ZyCoV-D vaccine has been given approval for children above the age of 12.
The decision on Covovax was taken at a meeting of the expert panel held on Friday to review data on the vaccine.
Covovax is the Indian version of US drug manufacturer Novavax’s recombinant nanoparticle protein-based Covid-19 vaccine. Novavax had granted a licence to the Serum Institute of India to produce the vaccine, and the Indian company began manufacturing it on June 25 last year.
Covovax is a two-dose vaccine and can be stored at refrigerated temperatures of 2 degrees Celsius to 8 degrees Celsius. It showed an overall efficacy of 90.4% in phase three trials for adults.
The vaccine was approved for use in India on adults on December 28. The World Health Organization granted emergency use approval to Covovax on December 17.
India has so far administered 1,96,83,60,782 coronavirus vaccine doses, government data showed. Of these 91,05,55,224 adults and children have received both the shots.
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