NEW TYPHOID VACCINE FROM BHARAT BIOTECH

Bharat Biotech, a city-based vaccine manufacturer, today announced the launch of Typbar-TCV, the world's first clinically proven typhoid conjugate vaccine for six months old infants and adults. Bharat Biotech CMD Krishna M Ella said the new vaccine brings hope to millions by protecting them against typhoid caused by salmonella typhi, a highly virulent and invasive enteric bacterium. Ella said that this is a fourth generation vaccine against typhoid disease which has been proven to provide long term protection to adults and infants. Typhoid vaccines fall short in two major counts, namely long-term protection and protection of children below two years of age. "We hope this vaccine will reach millions of people and help reduce the burden of this devastating disease in infants and children," Ella told reporters at a press conference here, adding that his company had commenced commercial production of Typbar-TCV in pre-filled syringes at its vaccine production facility in Genome Valley. "The pricing of the vaccine has not yet been decided. There will be two price structures. One for public institutions and the other one will be for private organisations. Pricing will be fixed by next week," he said. The plant has the capacity to produce 10 million doses each year, which is expandable to 50 million doses per year in future. Bharat Biotech is the largest producer and supplier of typhoid vaccine in the world, having distributed over 50 million doses globally, he claimed. Quoting World Health Organisation reports, Director-General of the International Vaccine Institute (IVI) Christian Loucq said that typhoid fever kills between 250,000 to 600,000, besides causing 20 million illnesses per year, affecting mostly school children. "The World Health Organisation reports that 90 per cent of typhoid deaths occur in Asia and persists mainly in children under five years of age. In India, typhoid fever is observed throughout the year and a greater number of cases coincide with the rainy season," Loucq said. While typhoid fever can be cured by antibiotics, resistance to anti-microbials is widespread along with poor diagnostics, he said, adding that hence prevention of typhoid fever is better than curing it.