Author: Biotech Express

India’s finance minister, Smt. Nirmala Sitharaman, presented the country’s budget Monday for the fiscal year that begins April 1 and ends March 31, 2022. In her speech to Parliament, she proposed more than doubling India’s health-care and wellbeing spending to 2.2 trillion rupees ($30.1 billion). That includes a new federal scheme with an outlay of 641 billion rupees over six years to develop the country’s capacity for primary, secondary and tertiary care as well as to strengthen national institutions and create new ones to detect and cure new diseases, Sitharaman said. The budget will allocate 350 billion rupees for COVID-19…

The European Commission authorized five genetically modified crops (three maize and two soybeans) and renewed the authorization for three maize crops used for food and feed. All of these GMOs have gone through a comprehensive and stringent authorization procedure, including a favorable scientific assessment by the European Food Safety Authority (EFSA). The authorization decisions do not cover cultivation. Member States did not reach a qualified majority either in favor or against the Standing Committee and the subsequent Appeal Committee. The European Commission has therefore the legal duty to proceed with the authorizations. The authorizations are valid for ten years, and…

While scientists and researchers have been calling for transparency in COVID-19 vaccine-related research data, the Centre, ironically, released the draft version of the Science, Technology, and Innovation Policy (STIP) in December 2020 based on the ethos of “Open Science”. Open Science has emerged as a global movement amidst a growing crisis in science that has affected India as well, and includes issues such as fabrication and falsification of data, plagiarism, unethical authorship, failure to disclose funding sources and gender disparity in research institutions. An interesting example to understand the crisis is the “10,000 steps a day to remain healthy” goal,…

Prof Rajeev K Varshney (born 13 July 1973) is a renowned agricultural scientist who is engaged in discovering, developing, and delivering innovative R&D solutions to tackle wicked problems facing global agriculture. He is currently serving as the Research Program Director – Genetic Gains and Director, Center of Excellence in Genomics and Systems Biology at the International Crops Research Institute for the Semi-Arid Tropics (ICRISAT), Hyderabad, India, a global agricultural research institute and a center under CGIAR consortium. He holds Adjunct/Honorary/ Visiting Professor positions at 10 academic institutions in Australia, China, Ghana, Hong Kong, and India. He is an elected fellow…

Introduction This report is based on International Virtual Conference “Supply Chain Challenges of COVID -19 Vaccines: Indian Imperative” that was organized by a consortium of Global Bio Supply Chain Association of Life Sciences, involving the Federation of Asian Biotech Associations (FABA), Bio Supply Management Alliance (BSMA) USA and Europe, BIRAC, ABLE, NITIE Mumbai, Indian Oil Corporation and the Institute of Chemical Technology. The fore-running vaccine candidates across the world are reaching the core human trials stages. The global demand is to produce vaccines for 7.8 billion people. The massive challenge is the global distribution and logistics of the vaccine.The vaccines…

by Shrikant Nema1, 2 1Division of Vector-Borne Diseases, ICMR-National Institute of Research in Tribal Health, Jabalpur 482 003, Madhya Pradesh, India 2School of Biotechnology, Rajiv Gandhi Proudyogiki Vishwavidhalya (State Technological University of Madhya Pradesh), Bhopal, 462 023, Madhya Pradesh, India Correspondence: shrikantnema2014@gmail.com Abstract Plasmodium vivax malaria is usually considered benign and has been neglected for so many years. However, this perception has changed in recent years due to the increase in the number of severe vivax malaria cases and associated deaths across the globe where malaria is endemic. The rising numbers of severe vivax malaria cases, diagnosis, relapse & re-infections…

A year back on December 31, 2019, China has reported pneumonia-like cases in Huanan Seafood Wholesale Market in Wuhan, Hubei Province. Chinese media on January 11, 2020, reported the first death due to the virus infection. On the next day, based on Next-generation sequencing results, Chinese authorities confirmed that the virus cluster is associated with coronavirus and termed this novel strain as a ‘severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus-2’ (SARS-CoV-2), also known as a COVID-19. The World Health Organisation (WHO) had declared a coronavirus outbreak as a Public Health Emergency of International Concern on 30 January 2020, by then at least…

Printed in January 2021 Issue India’s regulatory authority for medical products, the Central Drug Standards Control Organization (CDSCO), gave “restricted emergency approval” on 2nd January 2020 for two Covid-19 Vaccines, namely Serum Institute of India (SII)’s “Covishield” being manufactured in India under technology transfer from Oxford University-Astra Zeneca, and the indigenous “Covaxin” developed by Bharat Biotech in collaboration with ICMR/National Institute of Virology. AIPSN salutes the efforts of Indian scientists, research institutions and vaccine manufacturers in bringing to the forefront indigenous vaccines like Covaxin in less than a year, with some other candidates just a few months behind. As and…

Printed in January 2021 Issue The U.S. United States Department of Defense (DOD) awarded Moderna a contract worth $1,966,598,000 for an additional 100 million doses of its COVID-19 vaccine. The manufacturing will be handled in Cambridge, Massachusetts and is expected to be fulfilled by June 30, 2021. Moderna’s vaccine has been granted emergency use authorization (EUA) in the U.S. and in Canada. The EUA was granted by the FDA on December 18 for individuals 18 years of age and older. Health Canada granted authorization on December 23. The Canadian authorization came under Health Canada’s Interim Order Respecting the Importation, Sale…

Printed in January 2021 Issue Bharat Biotech International Limited in a statement issued on January 9 said the probable cause of death of a volunteer during the Phase-III trials of its COVID-19 vaccine in Madhya Pradesh was cardio-respiratory failure as a result of suspected poisoning. The company added that the case is under police investigation and the death is not related to the vaccine trial. A volunteer named Deepak Maravi received the trial vaccine at Bhopal’s People’s Medical College on December 12, 2020. He was found dead nine days later at his home. The investigation into the cause of death…