Covaxin likely to receive WHO approval by month-end: NITI Aayog

NITI Aayog's Member, Health, VK Paul on Wednesday said that Covaxin may soon receive Emergency Use Listing by the World Health Organisation. Data sharing and data evaluation are ongoing, and a positive decision may come soon, he said.

"The data sharing and data evaluation have been going on through multiple reviews, and we are close to a decision point. We must give time to WHO to make their decisions based on science. However, we hope that these decisions can be taken quickly because people who are receiving Covaxin have certain imperatives of travel. Most of us, who chose the concurrency, is important in terms of licensure. We are hoping for an early decision," Dr Paul said.

"We believe that a positive decision could be coming in, before the end of the month," he added.

Health Minister Mansukh Mandaviya had met WHO Chief Scientist Dr Soumya Swaminathan in August and held discussions on the WHO approval of Covaxin.

The vaccine's developer, Bharat Biotech, had submitted its Phase 3 clinical trials data as well. The data demonstrated 77.8 per cent efficacy to the Subject Expert Committee (SEC) of the Central Drugs Standard Control Organisation (CDSCO).

So far, Covid-19 vaccines by Pfizer-BioNTech, AstraZeneca, Johnson and Johnson, Moderna, and Sinopharm, have been approved by WHO. If approved, Covaxin recipients can travel abroad without mandatory quarantine.