GoI financing hundreds of projects to combat COVID-19: Vardhan

NEW DELHI: The Government of India is funding hundreds of projects in its fight against the COVID-19 pandemic and more than hundred start-ups have created innovative products to deal with the virus, said Dr Harsh Vardhan, Minister of Health and Family Welfare, on Monday, December 07. While speaking at the India- Portugal Tech Summit, organised by the Department of Science and Technology and the Confederation of Indian Industry, he also said that the government has declared a $120 million allowance for COVID-19 vaccine research.

Dr Vardhan added that this is being provided for COVID Suraksha Mission and is to be entirely for research and development in this field. Talking about the progress of vaccine trials in India, he said that about 30 vaccine candidates are in different stages of development. Two of them are in the last stage of development. First is ‘Covaxin’, which has been developed jointly by Indian Council of Medical Research and Bharat Biotech, and the second is ‘Covidshield’ developed by the Serum Institute of India.

Dr Vardhan further said that India is also hosting clinic trials for all the major vaccine contenders including the vaccine by Oxford University and the Russian vaccine. India has cared for over 50,000 start-ups in the last five years of which about 33 have achieved the Unicorn status with their evaluation over $1 billion, said the minister.