Bharat Biotech to come up with TB vaccine
Hyderabad: COVID-19 vaccine Covaxin maker Bharat Biotech International Limited is in the process of bringing out a vaccine against tuberculosis and soon the firm will sign an MoU with another firm for technology.
"Our honorable Prime Minister (Narendra Modi) has got an agenda of 2025 for the eradication of tuberculosis. I think we are in that direction. But we don't have the technology so we are partnering with somebody else. On that matter we should be announcing soon," Krishna Ella, Chairman, and Managing Director of Bharat Biotech reported the Economic Times.
Without providing details on the name of the firm with which BBIL will be inking MoU, Ella said the TB vaccine is currently undergoing phase 3 clinical trials. He said the immunology of the nasal vaccine being developed by the company against COVID-19 has been established.
Bharat Biotech International Limited (BBIL) is an Indian multinational biotechnology company headquartered in the city of Hyderabad, India engaged in the drug discovery, drug development, manufacture of vaccines, bio-therapeutics, pharmaceuticals and health care products. The company has been responsible for developing an eco-friendly recombinant and a naturally attenuated strain derived Rotavirus vaccine called ROTAVAC. They were one of the first to develop vaccines for viral diseases like Chikungunya and Zika. The company also produces vaccines for Japanese Encephalitis. Bharat Biotech has biosafety level 3 (BSL3) laboratories.
In September 2020, the company announced that it was going to manufacture the novel chimp-adenovirus, a single dose intranasal vaccine (codenamed BBV154) for COVID-19 being developed in collaboration with the American company Precision virologics and Washington University School of Medicine in St Louis, Missouri. It is currently undergoing clinical trials. On October 12, 2021, Bharat Biotech's Covaxin got approved for usage on children between 2 and 18 years of age.
Bharat Biotech had last month said BBV154 (Nasal vaccine) received approval for phase 3 clinical trials which will evaluate the jab for both the two-dose primary schedule and booster dose schedule.
Next Story