BENGALURU: From among 45 nominees in the Life Sciences category, the jury of the Infosys Science Foundation (ISF) has chosen Dr Gagandeep Kang as the winner for the Infosys Science Foundation prize that is to be awarded on January 7.
One of the reasons for this selection is her role in developing the indigenous rotavirus vaccine, Rotavac, which has been launched in four states in India. However, a plea on its safety is pending in the Supreme Court. Notwithstanding this, the jury and trustees bat for Dr Kang.
Dr Inder Verma, the Life Sciences jury, wrote to Express saying Rotavac was ‘in part’ a reason she was chosen. “Dr Kang was also lauded for conducting outstanding clinical trials at CMC Vellore and her other scientific achievements like analysis of the poor immunity of rotavirus vaccines compared to other vaccines,” Dr Verma wrote in an email.
Questioned if ISF’s trustees interfered with his decision, he replied, “No. The jury has complete freedom, but the ISF has the final authority to name the winners.”
When Express contacted S D Shibulal, president of the Board of Trustees, ISF, he said that they trust and rely on the jury’s expertise and uphold their decision as long as the winners meet the statutory criteria.
Dr Kang is the executive director of Translational Health Science and Technology Institute, an autonomous institute of the Department of Biotechnology. She was previously professor of microbiology at Christian Medical College (CMC), Vellore. Rotavac is a part of the Universal Immunisation Programme. It is produced by Bharat Biotech, a Hyderabad-based firm which is backed, among others, by the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation.
The controversy
On March 26, after a two-year clinical trial (2011-13), the Union Ministry of Health officially launched rotavirus vaccine. Rotavac is a three-dose, $1 per dose vaccine that combats diarrhoea deaths in infants, which is estimated to be 80,000 annually. The efficacy of Rotavac for severe gastroenteritis was 56.4 per cent in the first year of life and 49 per cent in the second year of the clinical trial. Questions about the efficacy and risks associated with the vaccine were first raised in a paper published in the journal ‘Vaccine’ in August 2014.
The vaccine also carries the risk of causing intussusception, a medical condition in which a part of the intestine folds into another section of intestine.