Theresearchers at Postgraduate Institute of Medical Education and Research(PGIMER) in Chandigarh on Sunday (April 26) said that the Mycobacterium w (Mw)vaccine is not a vaccine for coronavirus COVID-19 and will be used only as anadjunct.

It is to benoted that PGIMER, AIIMS Delhi and AIIMS Bhopal will jointly study the use ofMycobacterium w (heat-killed Mycobacterium indicus pranii) as adjunct to thetreatment of COVID-19 patients. The Mw vaccine is normally used to treatleprosy patients. The vaccine was originally developed as an immunomodulatorfor leprosy and it acts through the toll-like receptor pathway and enhanceshost-T cell responses.

"In arecently concluded multi-center trial, we found that Mw reduces mortality inICU patients with severe sepsis. Mw can potentially decrease the cytokine stormseen in patients with COVID-19, and may thus be of potential benefit inmanaging these patients and decreasing mortality. In the pre-study phase, weassessed safety of Mw in four hospitalized patients with COVID-19, and found noshort-term adverse effects. The impact of Mw use on long term safety andefficacy will only be known after conclusion of this CSIR-supported clinicaltrial, which will be initiated soon at all three centres. It is very early tosay about the outcome of results and its use," a PGI spokesperson said.

India has sofar reported 826 coronavirus deaths with a mortality rate of 3.1 per cent whileworld wide it is 7 per cent. The recovery rate in India has been steadilyincreasing and has gone up to 22% which is much better than other countries ofthe world. So far, in India as many as 5,913 people have been cured of theCOVID-19 infection.