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Smaller Gaps Between two Covishield Doses
Smaller Gaps Between two Covishield Doses
In Aug, Centre told Kerala HC that 84-day gap a must
New Delhi: India may soon allow a smaller gap between AstraZeneca Covid-19 vaccine doses for inoculations being carried out privately, it was reported on Wednesday. The report said private hospitals and clinics will give their paying patients the option to receive their second dose of the vaccine four weeks after the first, down from between 12 and 16 weeks currently.
The is not the first time that India would be revising its vaccination policy.
The Centre first increased the gap between Covid vaccine doses in May without the approval of the scientific group that it said recommended the move, citing three members of the National Technical Advisory Group on Immunisation (NTAGI) advisory body. The Ministry of Health announced the decision to change the gap from 6-8 weeks to 12-16 weeks on May 13. The decision was made at a time when supplies of the vaccine were falling short of demand and infections were surging across the country, according to News18 report.
The National Technical Advisory Group committee advised that "as per the Covid-19 working group recommendation, a dosing interval of a minimum three months between two doses of Covishield vaccine was recommended".
There has been considerable variation witnessed in how the two doses of this vaccine have been spaced by different countries. After earlier going for a 12-week gap between two doses, UK last month said that people who receive a first dose of the Oxford-AstraZeneca vaccine can come back for their second dose within 8, and not 12, weeks. Around the same time, India upped its gap to 12 weeks.
In August itself, Centre told the Kerala High Court that the 84-day gap between two doses of Covishield was fixed to increase the efficacy of the vaccine, as recommended by the National Expert Group on Vaccine Administration for Covid-19 (NEGVAC) and was also based on the technical inputs provided by the National Immunization Technical Advisory Group (NITAG). The Centre had said that "based on the recommendation of NEGVAC, the schedule of Covishield vaccination, under the national COVID-19 program, was to administer the second dose after 12 to 16 weeks. i.e. after 84 days from the first dose".
