Covaxin 93.4% effective against severe Covid: Lancet

Aditi Tandon
Tribune News Service
New Delhi, November 12

In an important confirmation of the efficacy and safety of India’s first indigenous Covid 19 vaccine, Covaxin, The Lancet on Friday published late-stage trial data of the product, demonstrating 65.2 per cent efficacy of the shot against the world’s most dominant virus strain Delta and over 93 per cent efficacy against severe disease.

The Lancet peer-review confirms the analysis which demonstrates Covaxin to be effective against Covid-19 and as the only Covid-19 vaccine to have demonstrated efficacy data from phase III clinical trials against the Delta variant at 65.2 per cent.

The peer review by the Lancet confirms late-stage phase 3 trial analysis which demonstrates Covaxin to be 77.8 per cent effective against symptomatic Covid-19 and 93.4 per cent effective against severe symptomatic Covid-19.

It further shows nil side effects of the India made shot, saying less than 0.5 pc trial participants experienced serious adverse events.

Covaxin phase 3 efficacy data results demonstrating 63.6 per cent protection against asymptomatic Covid-19, 65.2 per cent protection against the Sars-CoV-2, B.1.617.2 Delta variant and 70.8 per cent protection against all variants of the SARS-CoV-2 virus, have also been acknowledged by the Lancet researchers in a major boost to the India made vaccine developed jointly by Biotech and ICMR’s National Institute of Virology.

Following the review on Friday, Bharat Biotech said it was now moving fast to present clinical trial mode data on Covaxin efficacy among pregnant women to secure the WHO Emergency Use Listing for pregnant women category as well.

The WHO recently included Covaxin as the seventh shot in its existing list of six vaccines that the world body had previously approved for emergency use against Covid. WHO is however yet to grant EUL to Covaxin for use among pregnant women despite the submission of real-life data of the shot’s safety among a million pregnant women inoculated with Covaxin in India alone, the highest number anywhere.