New Delhi: The central government has intensified preparations for the vaccine for the monkeypox virus. In this sequence, a strain of the monkeypox virus has been isolated in India.
Monkeypox virus strain made in India will be used to make isolate, vaccine, and diagnostic kit
The National Institute of Virology (ICMR-NIV) Pune has isolated the strain of the monkeypox virus. It is an institution of the Indian Council of Medical Research (ICMR). Now, this virus will be used to make vaccines and diagnostic kits.
ICMR has reserved the intellectual property rights and commercial rights of the method and protocol to isolate and purify the virus. Now ICMR can use isolated viruses for the development of the monkeypox vaccine. For this, soon agreements can be made with pharmaceutical, pharma, and vaccine manufacturers.
The World Health Organization (WHO) says that there should be a targeted vaccination for monkeypox. Meaning those who are at higher risk of this should be vaccinated. This includes health workers, lab workers, and people with more than one sexual partner. The WHO says that not everyone will need to be vaccinated against monkeypox.
Talking about the world, the monkeypox has spread to 78 countries. More than 18 thousand cases of monkeypox have been reported in these countries. Of this, 70 percent of the cases are from the European regions. At the same time, 25 percent of the cases are from the US region. There have been five deaths due to monkeypox in the world so far. Apart from this, 10 percent of the total cases have required hospitalization.