A clinical trial of ‘Sepsivac’ drug starts: The PGIMER Chandigarh on Wednesday said it has started the clinical trial of Sepsivac on asymptomatic coronavirus patients amid the rising number of COVID-19 patients in India.

Dr. Ram Vishwakarma, the coordinator of the trial program at Post Graduate Institute of Medical Education and Research in Chandigarh, said the immunomodulator Sepsivac would be given to the coronavirus patients as vaccine so that the patients don’t redevelop infection, news agency ANI reported. 

“Clinical trial has begun at PGIMER Chandigarh to position immunomodulator Sepsivac as a drug. We are doing another trial on asymptomatic COVID-19 patients. It will be given to them as a vaccine,” said Dr. Ram Vishwakarma, coordinator of the trial program for use of Sepsivac in COVID-19 treatment. “A large number of lives can be saved if its trials are successful. If it works, it’ll take at least three months to be available for COVID-19 treatment. But we will still need other medicines,” Vishwakarma further said.

“COVID-19 can linger in a patient for one month so the third trial is on patients who have been cured/released for quarantine. It will be given to them as vaccines so that they don’t redevelop infection. So Sepsivac has vaccine as well as the therapeutic role,” added Vishwakarma.

Meanwhile, the total number of coronavirus patients in India has gone up to 33,050 while the death toll has reached 1,074, showed the latest figures from the Health Ministry. In the past 24 hours, the total number of Covid-19 cases has gone up by 1,718 while 67 deaths were reported. The total number of active coronavirus patients in the country stood at 23,651 while 8,324 have been cured of coronavirus.

The health minister also said that the mortality rate in COVID-19 patients in India is 3% as compared to 7% globally and around 86% of the fatalities have been reported among those with co-morbidities like diabetes, hypertension, chronic kidney and heart-related issues.