HYDERABAD: Emphasising on the need to accord top priority to protecting children from Covid-19, Vice President M Venkaiah Naidu on Friday urged the scientific community to expedite the development of SARS-CoV-2 vaccines for children.
Pointing out that the constantly mutating virus poses unforeseen challenges and there is no room for vaccine hesitancy, he said there is no other more powerful way to protect ourselves and people around us.
He urged vaccine makers to step up vaccine supplies to ensure vaccines are administered to all eligible citizens, which the government intends to do by the end of 2021.
Naidu, who was visiting the Genome Valley facility of Bharat Biotech on Friday, said that the intranasal vaccine being developed by the Hyderabad-based company could go a long way in tackling the issue of vaccine hesitancy as it was non-injectable and easy to administer.
Lauding Hyderabad’s emergence as a global vaccines and bulk drugs hub, he said this was a key reason why one of the recently sanctioned Central Drug Laboratories had been located here.
