COVID vaccine drive: Strong monitoring, data analysis to be carried out

New Delhi: Last year, during the height of COVID-19, the Union Health Secretary was asked as to when the pandemic would subside and life would be back to normal. The official said it needed a ‘science miracle’ for that.

Now, after some nine months of the first country-wide lockdown, the miracle seems to have happened - the COVID vaccine.

The Centre’s Subject Expert Committee (SEC), under the Central Drugs Control Organisation (CDCO), met on Friday and granted approval for the Oxford-AstraZeneca vaccine, produced in India by the Pune-based Serum Institute of India (SII). The vaccination ‘dry run’ is being held across the country and it is only a matter of days before the ‘most-vulnerable’ groups, including frontline health workers, start getting the vaccine.

The Covishield vaccine is found to be 70 per cent effective. The chances of a vaccinated person getting infected are very low. Scientists say social distancing and sanitisation could keep the infection at bay but vaccination is the best available option.

It is still not known as to how long the vaccine, once administered, would be effective. Apart from individual immunity, the vaccine will drive up the collective immunity of a society. When more people get immunity and their body has the antibody to resist COVID, the chances of getting infected, as a society, would be low.

Monitoring

The government has put in place a strict monitoring mechanism to ascertain the effects of the vaccine. The SII is mandated to send a report to the Centre every 15 days after the start of the vaccination drive. The designated expert committee has recommended vaccine use under a strictly regulated and monitored environment.

The committee should be informed of any adverse impact every 15 days. This should continue for two months. After this, the report should be submitted in three months. The sanction has been accorded on the basis of available trial data and the expert committee should be provided with more data as and when it is available.

The vaccine has two doses. The second dose should be administered in 4 to 6 weeks of the first. In the UK, the second dose is being given in 4 to 12 weeks.