Hyderabad: Prime Minister Narendra Modi visited Bharat Biotech’s facility at Genome Valley in Hyderabad on Saturday afternoon as part of his three city tour to review the progress in ongoing Covid- 19 vaccine development efforts in the country.

Modi spent well over an hour at Bharat Biotech, where he interacted with the company’s top brass, including its Chairman and MD Dr. Krishna Ella, as well as scientists involved with the development of Covaxin, India’s first indigenous Covid- 19 vaccine that is being developed by the Bharat Biotech. Senior Bharat Biotech Management made a detailed presentation to the Prime Minister on the work being done by Bharat Biotech and the progress on Covaxin, after which he proceeded to the auditorium to interact with the scientists, involved working on Covaxin.

The phase- III trials of Covaxin involving over 26K volunteers at 25 sites across the country, kicked- off earlier this month, the first and second phase of human trials at Covaxin involved around 1K volunteers. Bharat Biotech had earlier indicated that going by the results of phase I & II trials, Covaxin’s efficacy is expected to be well over 60%.