Covaxin booster dose trial shows ‘long-term safety’, claims Bharat Biotech

Ahead of Covaxin’s precaution or booster dose administration to front line workers and those aged above 60, Bharat Biotech on Saturday claimed that the booster dose trial showed promising results.

The trial of Covaxin booster jabs has demonstrated “long-term safety with no serious adverse events”, the vaccine maker said. “90% of recipients had a detectable neutralizing antibody response against the wild-type strain,” it added.

The Covaxin booster dose trial was performed on subjects 6 months after they received the second dose of the vaccine. As per Bharat Biotech, neutralisation against wild-type and Delta variants was 5 times higher than after a two-dose schedule.

Dr Krishna Ella, Chairman and Managing Director of Bharat Biotech, said, “These trial results provide a strong foundation towards our goal to provide Covaxin as a booster dose. Our goals of developing a global vaccine against COVID-19 have been achieved with the vaccine indicated for adults, children, 2 dose primary and booster doses. This enables the use of Covaxin as a universal vaccine.”

“Covaxin is formulated uniquely such that the same dosage can be administered to adults and children alike”, the vaccine maker said.

While protection against the severe Covid-19 infection remains high across the full 6 months, a decline in efficacy against symptomatic disease over time and the continued emergence of variants is still expected.