Coronavirus vaccine update: Pfizer's 90% safety rate to early Covaxin launch, all you need to know today

A hunt for a viable COVID-19 is underway, even as COVID count continues to surge across the world. Latest data from vaccine makers have brought us a tad bit closer to defeating the virus, with the earliest of doses expected to be available by December or January.

Here is a weekly refresher on where we are on a COVID vaccine timeline.

Pfizer became the first group in the race to announce high success rates which weigh over 90%. The announcement was made as the company released observatory data from early trials. Calling it a 'great day for humanity', Pfizer CEO said that the efficacy rates showcase the workability and safety of the vaccine, which is modelled using a novel mRNA technology.

Terming it a breakthrough success, company statements said that vaccine was able to deliver tolerable results in patients.

"Vaccine candidate was found to be more than 90% effective in preventing COVID-19 in participants without evidence of prior SARS-CoV-2 infection in the first interim efficacy analysis.”

The vaccine model is currently undergoing late-scale trials in centres across the USA and Germany. Pfizer was one of the first few companies to announce the availability of the vaccine by November-December, along with Moderna and Oxford. Adding to this, Pfizer has also said that they discovered no compromising side-effects so far, and plan to get emergency authorisation by early next month. The trials also involve sizeable elderly volunteers, so any efficacy results we have right now may be a glimmer of hope for high-risk patients as well.

Not only is Pfizer the only developer right now to have evidently high success rates, but the vaccine is also quite unique. It requires a temperature setting of -70 degree Celcius to control, which is a logistical challenge some countries will face right now.

Reports are unclear as to how soon, or how far the vaccine will be available. While India has reached out to vaccine makers, Spain's health minister has claimed that theirs might be the first country to receive doses post authorisation.

While Pfizer's reports and a past vaccination success pave way for promising developments, some experts have argued that it's too early to pin hopes on Pfizer as the leader. We will have more studies on factors like longevity, immunogenicity and side-effects and safety in the following two months.

Closer home, prime vaccine candidate Covaxin, which is heading to phase III trials is expected to launch by February, months ahead of the earlier speculated timeline. Success rates achieved in vaccine trials, which are being conducted pan India have paved way for an early launch. While no studies have been published so far, reports from principal investigators and scientists involved in the study have repeatedly suggested the safety and positive immunogenicity response achieved by the vaccine. The experimental jab is being tried out on volunteers aged between 18-45 years (healthy category) right now.

Hyderabad based Bharat Biotech, which is the parent company behind Covaxin has set up plans to initiate large-scale production in Odisha in the coming months.

It is being reported that Indian authorities have concentrated efforts and research into Covaxin, as Astrazeneca's vaccine deliveries are running 'late'. ICMR scientists have also said that more studies which prove Covaxin's safety rates will be delivered by early December, which is at par with global vaccine candidates.

The second indigenous vaccine candidate to be locally made and manufactured in India, Zydus Cadila's ZyCOV-D is also on track to launch the vaccine by March. The company has already ramped up production facilities and is in the middle of registering phase III trials, which will see the involvement of close to 30,000 volunteers. Early reports have backed up ZyCOV-D's ability to generate sufficient immune response in healthy volunteers. More updates are awaited by December.

The University of Oxford backed vaccine candidate, AZD-1222 has been witnessing a bumpy trial in the recent weeks. While early studies and analysis have marked the vaccine safe for use and effective against COVID-19, the discovery of certain complications pushed back the vaccine back. The vaccine is currently in phase III of testing and working on smoothening out deliveries with its global partners, including India. Latest reports also suggest that authorities have already initiated production of vaccine doses in Australia. This comes after the company alerted hospitals and healthcare workers in the UK to be 'prepared' to receive early doses of the vaccine.

The vaccine trials are expected to draw to an end by December last week globally. No other data, apart from its immune response have been revealed so far.

UAE may become the third country after China and Russia to start the process of emergency inoculation. Ruler Sheikh Mohammed bin Rashid Al-Maktoum released photos on social media, of him receiving an experimental jab of a COVID vaccine.

The region is involved in the clinical trials of two vaccine candidates- one from Russia and another by China, both in phase III testing. So far, none of the vaccines has been approved for large-scale use.

While no reports have confirmed plans of mass inoculation, it is being speculated that the process will soon be initiated. The news comes after both the vaccines under testing showed good success rates in trials and were discovered to be side-effect free.

Russian authorities, who are doing promising work on the development of a COVID-19 vaccine have hit a brief pause in the recent weeks. The country is in the middle of mass-scale inoculation and testing of its vaccine candidates, two of which are in mid-scale stages. According to reports, the halt has been made not because of the vaccine workability, but due to the excessive demand for the vaccine, which has led to a shortage. Director of the Russian agency responsible for development and testing of the vaccine said that the authorities faced a shortage of a 'second' component of the vaccine candidate, which has to be administered weeks after the first dose.

Meanwhile, the Indian leg of the trials are expected to be launched soon, making way for a 2021 launch in the country,

American company Novavax secured approvals to start late-scale trials in its home country. The vaccine candidate has also received emergency authorisation from the FDA, along with Eli Lilly's novel antibody treatment.

The company has also partnered with Indian pharma major, Serum Institute of India (SII) to conduct simultaneous phase III testing in India. Registrations and approval process is underway. This will make Novavax the third international company to conduct and market vaccines in India.

Brazil, which like India is seeing clinical trials of multiple vaccine candidates suspended one of the vaccine trials of a Chinese based company. According to early reports, medical authorities took the decision of bringing Sinovac trials to a halt after an adverse reaction, a death was discovered in the volunteer group in the last week of October. Sinovac, which is also in phase III testing is conducting one of the largest trials in Brazil.

The decision of suspension has been taken today (November 10). While regulators have not specified whether or not the reaction was discovered in the testing centres, it certainly comes as bad news for Sinovac, which claimed to have over a 90% success rate since the start of the trials.