Bharat Biotech's intranasal Covid-19 vaccine to get DCGI nod soon? Here's what we know

Chairman and Managing Director of Bharat Biotech International Limited (BBIL), Krishna Ella, on Tuesday, said that Bharat Biotech, which is working on an intranasal Covid-19 vaccine candidate is hopeful of getting regulatory licenses this month if everything goes according to plan. 

Krishna said that BBIL, which has a vaccine manufacturing plant in Ankleshwar in Gujarat is one of the two plants in the world to manufacture vaccines for monkeypox. The other one is in Bavarian Nordic, Germany.

At a recently held event, he said, "We will be applying for licenses, and (they) should come. If everything goes well, we know by next month (August). You (people) would rather get the coronavirus nasal vaccine and if any variant comes it is easy to plug in quickly and move fast. So we are optimistic that both injectable and nasal strategy will work protecting people's lives in the future, any variant comes also we can handle." 

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Ella said the firm completed clinical trials of the nasal vaccine with about 4,000 volunteers and there is no single instance of side effects or adverse reactions reported so far.

The Drug Controller General of India gave its nod to conduct clinical trials for BBIL's intranasal vaccine as a booster dose. Separately, the DCGI also granted permission to the firm to conduct a phase-3 clinical trial to compare the immunogenecity and safety of the BBV-154 (intranasal) with Covaxin. This trial has been permitted to be conducted at nine sites.

Justifying the reason for a nasal vaccine for coronavirus, he said any injectable vaccine only protects the lower level (of the body). That's why people who were vaccinated with injectable vaccines may still get RT-PCR positive, whereas the nasal jab gives protection to the whole body.

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Replying to a query, he predicted that the country may face higher hospitalisations with the emerging coronavirus variant BA.5 as the new form may "evade the vaccine". 

Krishna said, "It is totally different from delta variant. It is totally different from omicron also. They call "deltaomicron", a combination of both. I think if that attacks then it is going to be an issue. But we keep watching. We are working on that also. Risk mitigation we are trying to do. We are well prepared now... I think hospitalisation will increase if there are BA.5 attacks."