A study on mixing Covishield and Covaxin doses has been given the go-ahead by the Drugs Controller General Of India (DCGI), according to news agency ANI.
The study and its clinical trials will be conducted by Christian Medical College, Vellore.
"Permission has been granted for a research study by CMC Vellore (Tamil Nadu) on mixing of vaccines doses," Dr VK Paul, NITI Aayog Member (Health), said.
Last week, a Subject Expert Committee of the Central Drugs Standard Control Organisation (CDSCO) had recommended conducting the study on mixing the two vaccines.
The phase 4 clinical trials are said to involve 300 adult volunteers.
The aim of the trial is to gauge the safety and efficacy of taking doses of two different vaccines–Covaxin and Covishield.
“The SEC (subject expert committee) after detailed deliberations recommended granting permission to CMC, Vellore for conducting the phase-4 clinical trial covering 300 healthy volunteers for mixing of COVID-19 vaccines Covaxin and Covishield.”Official sources quoted by PTI
Why This Trial Matters
While many countries have already started administering mix-and-match combinations of different COVID-19, India is yet to approve of such a move citing a lack of clinical trial data on the vaccines being used in the country.
A major advantage of being able to mix and match vaccines is that it would help combat vaccine shortage and uptake delays to some degree.
What Science Says About Mixing Vaccines
Speaking to FIT for a previous article, Immunologist Dr Satyajit Rath explained why although mixing vaccines was unlikely to have any adverse affects.
"Vaccine are not medications, instead they actually evoke targeted responses from the body. Mixing vaccines usually does not cause any problems. We do after all give many vaccines together to infants in the childhood immunisation programme."Dr Satyajit Rath, Immunologist
Moreover, research conducted in other countries have shown encouraging results.
Interim results of a study conducted by the Oxford University and published in the medical journal Lancet found that one dose of AstraZeneca vaccine followed by Pfizer produced higher T-cell response than two doses of AstraZeneca.
While it is likely to not cause any adverse effects, it's not advisable without proper trials, top Virologist Shahid Jameel said.
(Written with inputs from PTI.)
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