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Two volunteers who were given Oxford vaccine are fine

The vaccine trials are being conducted by the Serum Institute of India in Pune

Pune: Two volunteers who have been given the Oxford COVID-19 vaccine candidate at a medical college here are normal, a senior official from the medical facility said on Thursday.

The two men, aged 32 and 48, were given the first shot of the Covishield vaccine candidate, being manufactured by the Serum Institute of India (SII) at Bharti Vidyapeeth's Medical College and Hospital on Wednesday. The dose will be repeated after one month, an official said.

"Since yesterday, our medical team has been in touch with the two volunteers and both are fine. They do not have any pain, fever, side reaction or systemic illness post-vaccination," the medical college and hospital's deputy medical director Dr Jitendra Oswal said.

After the vaccine was administered on Wednesday, both volunteers were observed for 30 minutes and later allowed to go home, he said.

"They have been given all the necessary emergency numbers (to contact in case of need) and our medical team is also conducting follow-ups with them," he added.

The vaccine dose will be repeated on both volunteers after one month, the hospital's medical director Dr Sanjay Lalwani said on Wednesday.

He said in all, 25 candidates will be given the vaccine in the next seven days.

Dr Sonali Palkar, in-charge of the medical college's research cell, said four to five persons were screened on Wednesday and a decision to administer the vaccine to them as part of the clinical trial is subject to their COVID-19 and antibody test reports.

SII, the world's largest vaccine maker has signed an agreement to manufacture the potential vaccine developed by the Jenner Institute of Oxford University in collaboration with British-Swedish pharma company AstraZeneca.

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