COVAXIN is effective against Delta Plus variant of COVID-19, news agency ANI reported, quoting medical body ICMR, as saying. Covaxin was developed by Bharat Biotech in collaboration with the Indian Council of Medical Research (ICMR) and its subsidiary National Institute of Virology (NIV).
The Delta plus, also known as AY.1 variant is a mutated version of B.1.617.2 strain, named delta by the WHO. Though there is no indication yet of the severity of the disease caused by the new variant, Delta Plus is said to be resistant to the monoclonal antibody cocktail treatment for COVID-19 recently authorised in India.
Currently, as many as 70 cases of Delta Plus variant, of coronavirus were found in genome sequencing, Union science and technology minister Jitendra Singh said on July 30. In a written reply to a question in Lok Sabha, the minister said that 58,240 samples of Sars-CoV-2 have been sequenced in India so far, out of which 46,124 were analysed by the Indian SARS-CoV-2 Genomics Consortium (INSACOG).
"A total of 70 Delta Plus strains have been found as on 23.07.2021," Singh said.
In a statement on July 19, the INSACOG said there is currently no evidence of any new Delta sub-lineage that is of greater concern than Delta.
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Bharat Biotech on April 21 had also announced phase 3 interim analysis results of Covaxin that demonstrated that the COVID-19 vaccine has 78 percent efficacy which was slightly lower than the first interim data that indicated efficacy of 81 percent at a four-week interval between two doses.
It was also found that Covaxin is 65 percent effective against the Delta variant of the coronavirus disease.
Meanwhile, the trials of Covaxin is also being conducted on children. Dr Randeep Guleria, Director of All India Institute of Medical Science (AIIMS) has informed that the trials on children are underway and the results are expected by September.
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