INDIA, Russia kick-off human trial for Covid-19 Vaccines

AS Russia has made public its “World’s first coronavirus covid19 vaccine” is ‘safe’, the United States and the United Kingdom accused the country of trying to steal inputs about the long-awaited drug. The Defence Ministry of Russia has revealed that all the volunteers who were part of the human trials did not show “serious adverse events, health complaints, complications or side effects”. The defence ministry has also claimed that it expects clinical trials of the potential coronavirus vaccine will be fully completed by the end of July. Russia has rubbished the accusations of the United Kingdom and the United States that Russian intelligence agencies are attempting to hack research of institutes working on the coronavirus vaccine.UK’s National Cyber Security Centre, United States’ Department for Homeland Security (DHS), Cyber-security Infrastructure Security Agency (CISA), and the Canadian Communication Security Establishment (CSE) has asked the Kremlin to desist from hijacking scientists’ efforts to develop Covid-19 vaccine.UK’s National Cyber Security Centre says it is believed hackers are using ‘spear phishing; custom malware; WellMess and WellMail’ to target the vaccine research institutes. The alleged culprit is a familiar foe. Intelligence agencies in the United States, United Kingdom and Canada have alleged that the hacking groups also blamed for American election interference four years ago, are attacking academic and pharmaceutical research institutions involved in Covid-19.

Meanwhile, India’s indigenous potential COVID Coronavirus vaccine developer Zydus Cadila has received a nod from Mexico’s regulatory authority Cofepris to conduct human trials in that country. Zydus Cadila has received approval for clinical trials with its biological therapy, Pegylated Interferon alpha-2b, ‘PegiHepTM’. The company has revealed that the human trials will be “an open-label, randomized, comparator-controlled study to evaluate safety, efficacy and tolerability in patients with COVID-19”. India’s COVAXIN produced by the Indian Council of Medical Research (ICMR), Bharat Biotech, and National Institute of Virology, Pune, have started its human trials for the country’s first indigenous COVID vaccine.