India’s first COVID-19 vaccine candidate approved for human trials

The Drug Controller General of India has approved Bharat Biotech’s COVID-19 vaccine for human trials, making it India’s first domestic candidate to get the green light from the government’s drug regulator as cases surge in a country with more than 1.3 billion people, Reuters reported. The company in a statement said that they received approval to conduct a Phase I and II clinical trial of Covaxin, which was developed along with the Indian Council of Medical Research’s National Institute of Virology.

Human clinical trials are scheduled to start across the country in July for the vaccine, which was developed and manufactured in Bharat Biotech’s facility at Genome Valley in Hyderabad, India.