What is the progress that Serum Institute is making in the vaccine race along with AstraZeneca PLC?

Adar Poonawala of Serum Institute has confirmed that he was fairly thrilled by the 90% effectiveness displayed by the vaccine candidate that is jointly being designed by AstraZeneca and Oxford Research. Serum will manufacture and also distribute the vaccine in India as well as in a clutch of other emerging market countries.

Like the other vaccine two principal candidate viz. Pfizer/BionTech and Moderna; this AstraZeneca / Oxford Research joint collaboration has also shown over 94% effectiveness in first round of clinical trials.

However, AstraZeneca noted that when the second round was repeated after a month, the efficacy fell to around 62% taking the average to 70%. That is considered to be a very good starting point for any vaccine candidate, which explains why Mr. Poonawala is pleased with the results of the clinical tests.

Even in the case of Pfizer/BionTech and Moderna, the overall percentage is expected to come down once the second round is done. Serum is the official Indian partner for the Covishield vaccine brought out by AstraZeneca and Oxford Research.

AstraZeneca has confirmed that it had tied up production of up to 3 billion doses by the middle of 2021, which is a lot of production in a short span of time. According to Poonawala, there is an additional advantage that the AstraZeneca / Oxford Research vaccine has in the Indian context. It is cheaper to produce so likely to be sold cheaper. Unlike Pfizer, the freezing requirements are much lower making it more practicable in Indian conditions.