The market authorisation to COVID-19 vaccine Covovax as a heterologous booster dose for adults having administered double doses of Covishield or Covaxin, has been approved by Drug Controller General of India (DCGI), the media reports stated.

Previously, the Subject Expert Committee of the Central Drugs Standard Control Organisation (CDSCO) has also approved it.

As per media reports, the Director of Government and Regulatory Affairs at the Serum Institute of India (SII), Prakash Kumar Singh, recently wrote to the DCGI reagarding the approval of Covovax heterologous booster dose for people aged 18 years and above against the surge in COVID-19 pandemic situation in some countries, an official source had said.

On Wednesday, CDSCO’s Subject Expert Committee pondered over the issue to come up with recommendation for market authorisation of Covid jab Covovax as a heterologous booster dose for adults having administered two doses of Covishield or Covaxin, the media reports stated.

Technology from Novavax is deployed to manufacture Covovax. European Medicines Agency has approved it for conditional marketing authorisation. It was also listed in WHO’s emergency-use listing on December 17, 2021.

The US-based vaccine maker Novavax announced a licence agreement with the SII In August 2020 for the development and commercialisation of NVX-CoV2373, its COVID-19 vaccine candidate in India and low-and-middle-income countries.