The major update from around the world as on March 4, 2021 pertains to one of India’s most significant, recent makes- the hundred percent ingenuously made COVID 19 vaccine- Covaxin. So the question is- what about the Covaxin is making news at this time?
It appears that yet another country has okayed the use of the Covaxin and this time, it’s Zimbabwe. But there’s also a bit of a context to Zimbabwe accepting the usage of the India-made vaccine, as prepared by the revered Bharat Biotech.
In doing so, the landlocked country in southern Africa has become the first of all African countries to have accepted the usage of the Covaxin. And apart from it being a win-win for the African nation, it also augurs well for the growing popularity of India’s homegrown vaccine, aimed to tackle the morbid challenge of the pandemic.
That said, the landmark announcement was actually announced by the Zimbabwean embassy as on Thursday, i.e., March 4. The embassy took to popular microblogging site Twitter and shared the development.
But that’s not all; interestingly, as on March 3, 2021 Bharat Biotech International Limited had shared an interesting announcement pertaining to the same wherein it confirmed that the vaccine is around 81 per cent effective against the Coronavirus.
And with that development, any doubts, therefore, regarding the performance or efficacy of the vaccine are rendered obsolete- isn’t it?
That being said, here’s the exact tweet posted by officials of the Zimbabwean embassy on the social media communication site:
Zimbabwe has authorized the use of COVAXIN, India’s indigenous COVID-19 vaccine, becoming the first country in Africa to do so. Trying to get it to Zimbabwe at an early date,” the embassy, located in Zimbabwe’s capital city of Harare.
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But opposed to the warm acceptance that the India-made Covaxin is finding at this point in time, it wasn’t too long ago that the now-trusted antidote against the achingly troubling pandemic found itself in the center of a storm.
If one were to rewind the clocks back to early January, 2021 then the vaccine found itself catching ire in lines with being cleared by the Drugs Controller General of India, also known as the DCGI (for the vaccination drive in the country).
And the following was the cause of the concern: it was alleged that Covaxin was given approval by the aforementioned body without it completing the phase 3 trials. And in stark contrast to the Bharat Biotech-made Covaxin, which finds itself with an 81 percent effectiveness percentage, the Oxford University-AstraZenaca vaccine, was as of the last year, found to be 70 percent effective against the disease.
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Additionally speaking, where it comes to gauging the success of Covaxin, it’s worthwhile to remember what India’s External Affairs Minister S. Jaishankar had shared earlier toward the start of February this year.
It was already shared in the public domain that no fewer than 25 countries were in queue for the 100-percent ‘Make In India’ vaccine. This just goes to show that India’s taken giant strides in the fight against the COVID 19 vaccine.
As a matter of fact, apart from sending a huge consignment of the same to Barbados as a benevolent measure, India had also entered a trade deal with Brazil to supply the COVID 19 vaccine (as of earlier this year).