The trial has been approved by the Drugs Controller General of India.
Haryana Home Minister Anil Vij today said he had offered himself as a volunteer for an anti-COVID-19 vaccine trial that is set to begin in his state soon. Mr Vij, who is also the state's health and science and technology minister, made the announcement today on Twitter.
Bharat Biotech on Monday announced the commencement of Phase III trials of COVAXIN, involving 26,000 volunteers across India. The trials will be conducted in partnership with the Indian Council of Medical Research (ICMR) and will be the largest clinical trial conducted for a COVID-19 vaccine in India, according to ANI. The trial has been approved by the Drugs Controller General of India.
COVAXIN has been evaluated in about 1,000 subjects in Phase I and Phase II clinical trials, with promising safety and immunogenicity data.
In Haryana, Pandit Bhagwat Dayal Sharma University of Health Sciences in Rohtak and ESIC hospital in Faridabad have been identified among those sites across India where trials will be conducted, as per Bharat Biotech's statement cited by ANI.
With a 32 per cent one-day jump in the number of new coronavirus infections, India has recorded 38,617 fresh COVID-19 cases in the past 24 hours, according to government data. India also saw 474 COVID-19-related deaths in this period, taking its overall fatalities up to 1,30,993. So far, the country has recorded a total of 89.12 lakh COVID-19 cases so far since the January outbreak.
Haryana alone has recorded over two lakh cases and more than 2,000 deaths till now.