Mixing doses of two Covid-19 vaccines is “very wrong” and this vaccination approach will lead to a blame game between different vaccine manufacturers if something goes wrong, said Cyrus Poonawalla, chairman of the Serum Institute of India.
The Pune-based institute is the world’s largest manufacturer of vaccines by volume.
This comment comes days after the Drugs Controller General of India (DCGI) approved a proposal to conduct a study to mix Covaxin and Covishield vaccines in India. The study, in which 300 people are participating, is being carried out by the Christian Medical College in Vellore.
The purpose of this study is to assess whether a person can be given two different vaccinations – one each Covishield and Covaxin – to complete the vaccination course.
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“There is no need to mix the cans,” Cyrus Poonawalla was quoted by the Economic Times as saying. He added that if anything goes wrong with this approach, a blame game would begin between the makers of the two jabs.
“If something goes wrong, Serum will say the other vaccine is no good, and they (the other vaccine company) will blame us that there was a problem with our vaccine. I think it’s very wrong, the vaccines mix and you can quote. ” me, “the report quoted Cyrus Poonawalla.
He opposed mixing Covid-19 vaccines, adding that such mixing of doses has “not been proven at all” in field trials.
He spoke at Tilak Maharashtra Vidyapeeth in Pune.
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Recently the Indian Council of Medical Research (ICMR) also conducted a study on a group of vaccine recipients who were accidentally administered doses of various Covid-19 vaccines in Uttar Pradesh earlier this year.
In its study (which has yet to be peer-reviewed), ICMR said mixed doses of Covaxin and Covishield have shown better results in building immunity to the virus that causes Covid-19.
The study was carried out in Uttar Pradesh between May and June. According to the ICMR, the study suggests that immunization with a combination of a vaccine based on an adenovirus vector platform followed by an inactivated whole virus vaccine was not only safe but also resulted in better immunity to variants of the coronavirus.
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