PM Takes First Dose of COVID-19 Vaccine

The Prime Minister of India, Narendra Modi, takes first dose of COVID-19 vaccine on March 1, 2021 at AIIMS, New Delhi. After vaccination, he appealed to those people who are eligible to get their vaccination done.

Covid-19 Vaccination in India

The national vaccination programme to for the virus called “SARS-CoV-2” which has caused ongoing Covid-19 Pandemic was started on January 16, 2021. In the first phase of the vaccination, prioritises were given to the healthcare and frontline workers. Those aged above 60 years were also covered under this vaccination drive. Then those aged above 45 and suffering from certain comorbidities were administered vaccine. The Secretary-General of the United Nations, António Guterres, recently in January 2021 stated that, the vaccine-production capacity of India is the best asset world have got. As of February 2021, 1,43,01,266 vaccine doses have been administered across India.

Who developed the vaccine?

The Serum Institute of India had started the Covid-19 vaccination trial on animals by February 2020. It also tested the Zydus Cadila in March 2020. Later, the Indian Council of Medical Research (ICMR) associated with the Bharat Biotech in May 2020 in order to develop the vaccine completely in India. India had 30 candidates of vaccine in development till May 2020. Following the clinical trials, ICMR announced to launch BBV152 COVID vaccine or Covaxin which is the first COVID-19 vaccine on August 15, 2020 to cut red tape. Covaxin  had positive results on animals with respect to building immunity against COVID-19. The vaccine candidate ZyCoV-D by Zydus Cadila also underwent the human trials. However, in August 2020, the COVAXIN got approval from DCGI for trial phases II & III. The Serum Institute also joined GAVI along with the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation so as to produce 100 million doses of vaccine.

Month: Current Affairs - March, 2021