FRANKFURT AM MAIN, Jan 1, 2021 (AFP) - German firm BioNTech said Friday it was racing to ramp up production of its Covid-19 jab in Europe, to fill the "gap" left by the lack of other approved vaccines. The vaccine developed by BioNTech and its US partner Pfizer was the first to be approved in the European Union in late December. Countries including Britain, Canada and the United States okayed the Pfizer/BioNTech vaccine earlier and have since also greenlighted jabs by US firm Moderna or Oxford/AstraZeneca, leaving the EU's inoculation drive lagging behind. "The current situation is not rosy, there's a hole because there's an absence of other approved vaccines and we have to fill this gap with our vaccine," BioNTech co-founder Ugur Sahin told Der Spiegel weekly. Criticism of the slow pace of Europe's vaccine rollout has grown louder in recent days. In Germany, where the focus has been on inoculating elderly people in care homes, senior doctors hav...
Kathmandu, 1,JANUARY . Serum Institute of India's vaccine candidate, Covishield, is set for approval by Subject Expert Committee, of the Drug Controller General of India, an informed source confirmed to The Hindu. SII has partnered with AstraZeneca to bring to market the Oxford vaccine, which has been approved by health authorities in the United Kingdom on Wednesday. The committee meeting, which is ongoing is also currently reviewing an application by Bharat Biotech for its vaccine candidate Covaxin. A formal statement by the health ministry is expected later today. Both SII had Bharat Biotech are testing the vaccine in ongoing phases-3 trials in India, the results of which have not been publicised yet. For Covishield's appraisal process, the source said, it was the nod by the UK regulator and the immunogenicity data from a phase -2 trial on 100 volunteers in India were relied on to accord emergency use approval. Covishield is currently being tested in 1,600 volunteers a...