HQ Team
January 27, 2023: Bharat Biotech, an Indian maker of vaccines for infectious diseases, has rolled out the world’s first nasal Covid-19 drops as a booster dose, according to a company statement.
iNCOVACC nasal drops work on a vector-based platform, which can be updated with emerging variants leading to large-scale production within a few months.
These rapid response timelines, combined with the ability of cost-effective and easy intranasal delivery, make it an ideal vaccine to address future infectious diseases, according to the statement.
Viral vector-based vaccines use a harmless virus to smuggle the instructions for making antigens from the disease-causing virus into cells, triggering protective immunity against it.
Viral vector-based vaccines differ from most conventional vaccines as they don’t contain antigens but use the body’s own cells to produce them.
‘Several million doses’
A rollout of iNCOVACC is expected to begin in private hospitals that have placed advance orders. An initial manufacturing capacity of several million doses yearly has been established, and this can be scaled up to a billion doses as required.
Phase III trials (as a two-dose regimen) were conducted for safety, and immunogenicity in more than 3,100 subjects, in 14 trial sites across India.
Heterologous booster dose studies were held for safety and immunogenicity in more than 875 subjects across nine Indian sites. The intranasal vaccine was administered to those previously completing a regimen of the commonly administered Covid-19 vaccines.
The recipients demonstrated significant Mucosal IgA antibody levels (measured in the saliva). Mucosal IgA antibodies in the upper respiratory tract may provide benefits in reducing infections and transmission.
Washington University partnership
iNCOVACC was developed in partnership with Washington University, St. Louis, which had designed and developed the recombinant adenoviral vector construct and evaluated it in preclinical studies for efficacy.
Product development related to preclinical safety evaluation, large-scale manufacturing scale-up, formulation and delivery device development, including human clinical trials, were conducted by Bharat Biotech.
Washington University licensed the vaccine technology to Bharat in 2020 for further development.
Dr Mansukh Mandaviya, Minister for Health and Family Welfare, said: “Today, India contributes 65% of the vaccine need of the world, saving lives of children, adolescents and adults… India will not be just known as the pharmacy of the world, but will be known for its research and innovation in vaccines.”
The Technology Development Board of the government of India has helped Bharat Biotech in debt financing for commercial-scale manufacturing facilities.
It will cost INR 800 ($9.67) for private hospitals and INR 325 for government healthcare institutions.
