Bill Gates: world needs India's cooperation in developing Covid-19 vaccine

Microsoft founder and widely-known billionaire Bill Gates said India's wide experience will be very beneficial to the process of Covid-19 vaccine manufacturing, stressing that the world is looking to the contribution of the Asian giant to the process of developing a vaccine.

Gates: "The world is looking at India"

 “India is a leading vaccine producer, we need cooperation from India on manufacturing a Covid-19 vaccine. The world is looking at India for some of that capacity to be available to developing countries,” Gates said.

Gate also expressed his confidence that sometime next year an effective and safe vaccine will be rolled out in India and huge amounts of doses will be available. "Obviously, all of us want to get a vaccine out in India as fast as we can, once we know that it's very effective and very safe, and so the plans are coming into focus that sometime next year, it's very likely that roll-out will take place and take place in fairly big volume."

In addition, Gates stated he feels upbeat as by the first quarter of the next year several Covid-19 vaccine candidates will be undergoing the final stage trials.

Three vaccine candidates on trial in India

India has three coronavirus vaccine candidates undergoing clinical trials, including the Oxford vaccine that is being developed in cooperation with AstraZeneca, whose trials are conducted by the Serum Institute of India in numerous locations. The trials, however, have been temporarily suspended due to the illness of a volunteering candidate participating in the trial in the UK.