DNA Special: Calf serum in Covaxin? Congress leader spreads 'fake news' about Bharat Biotech's vaccine

Today, we have a lot of news to share but most of them are Fake News. This Fake News has been spread from a 'blue tick' account on Twitter. On social media, Congress National Coordinator Gaurav Pandhi quoted an RTI to claim that Covaxin uses the serum of a cow calf that is less than 20 days old. It is called calf serum.

Blood is made up of many components such as White Blood Cells, Red Blood Cells, Vitamins, Plasma and Antibodies. When all the components are separated from this blood after freezing, the liquid that remains is called serum.

Gaurav Pandhi spread fake news that this liquid of cow's calf is mixed in Covaxin. But the RTI which quoted this claim, does it also say the same? It is very important to understand it today.

Today, putting a brake on this Fake News, the Central government said that the fact that the serum of a cow's calf is found in Covaxin is completely wrong. Now we tell you what is the correct information.

Covaxin is prepared from the dead cells of the coronavirus. And this work is done in different stages.

While the serum is used in the process of making the vaccine, it is not present in the final formulated product. Newborn calf serum is used only for the preparation and growth of vero cells and that serum from bovine and other animal are standard enrichment ingredient used globally for vero cell growth.

Different kinds of bovine and other animal serum are standard enrichment ingredients used globally for Vero cell growth. Vero cells are used to establish cell lines that help in the production of vaccines. This technique has been used for decades in Polio, Rabies, and Influenza vaccines.

These Vero cells, after the viral growth, are washed with water, with chemicals, technically known as buffer, many times to make it free from the newborn calf serum. Thereafter, these Vero cells are infected with coronavirus for viral growth.

The Vero cells are completely destroyed in the process of viral growth. Thereafter, this grown virus is also killed (inactivated) and purified. This killed virus is then used to make the final vaccine, and in the final vaccine formulation, no calf serum is used.

Hence, the final vaccine (Covaxin) does not contain newborn calf serum at all and the calf serum is not an ingredient of the final vaccine product.

Now the question is that when there was no objection to these vaccines, how did this controversy arise today and where did the fake news come from.

Every person in India gets a maximum of 15 vaccines by the age of 16. Corona is not the first vaccine, which you are getting. Many vaccines are given to babies after birth. There are five major vaccines.

The first vaccine is for TB, which is called BCG vaccine. The second vaccine is for Hepatitis B. The third vaccine is polio. Children are given polio drops four times.

The fourth vaccine is Haemophilus influenzae. It is given at 6 weeks after birth and then after 14 weeks. And the fifth vaccine is Rota Virus. This also starts after 6 weeks of birth.

Adding up all these vaccines, under India's National Immunization Campaign, children receive more than 15 vaccines by the age of 16. And most of these vaccines are made from animal serum. But the National Coordinator of Congress spread this lie on social media and the RTI which he shared does not support his words.

Gaurav Pandhi told another lie to the country today and that is that cow calves are killed for their serum. This is very big fake news. Bharat Biotech, the Hyderabad-based company that makes Covaxin, also issued a statement calling this news wrong and misleading and the government also exposed this fake news in its official statement.

Now the question is whether Twitter will suspend Gaurav Pandhi's account and snatch Blue Tick from him?