The initial COVID-19 case in India was detected in a 20-year-old student who had returned to Kerala from Wuhan. According to scientists at the National Institute of Virology (NIV), the sample was sent on January 27, 2020 and upon confirmation of its positive status, the teams immediately alerted the director of the Indian Council of Medical Research-National Institute of Virology (ICMR). done. -NIV).
Dr. Priya Abraham, former director of ICMR-NIV, remembers that long night. The laboratory results were rechecked and additional testing was initiated. Abraham successfully brought together multiple ICMR-NIV scientists and technicians to collaborate in teams and complete various tasks. “We have achieved a lot,” Dr Abraham told The Sunday Express. Praising the unwavering cooperation and support of the ICMR-NIV staff, Dr Abraham said, “I was very fortunate to have the complete cooperation and support of the NIV staff and I salute them.”
Dr Priya Abraham was not the only woman who rose to the occasion of duty to fight the unknown during the Covid pandemic, which has claimed over 5.32 lakh lives so far. So when the movie ‘The Vaccine War’ portrays some of the challenges that scientists, especially women, have to face, not many people will take offense to them.
Training workshops were the order of the day and in the brief time that ICMR got, they were able to enhance their preparedness level. Dr Raman Gangakhedkar, former head of the Division of Epidemiology and Communicable Diseases at ICMR, who became the face of the institute during government briefings to the media on the COVID-19 situation during the early days of the pandemic (before retiring in June 2020). , commemorates the exemplary work done by many women scientists.
“The big challenge was how to expand the laboratory network. The biggest contribution in this area has been from Dr. Nivedita Gupta, who will train laboratories on how to conduct RT-PCR tests with technical support from ICMR-NIV at ICMR headquarters. By the end of June, he was responsible for training 670 labs in the country. It was indeed a credible effort,” said Dr. Gangakhedkar.
Dr. Gupta also led the formulation of validation protocols for a variety of diagnostic tests for COVID and this helped in increasing indigenous production and scale up and taking the test to the field and also brought down the cost of the test by approximately Rs. 50,000. Decreased by several times, scientists are aware of this. Dr. Gupta was also responsible for setting up verification centers across the country.
The next important step in the vaccine development process was to isolate the virus and identify a highly infectious sample, a challenge that Dr. Pragya Yadav and her team successfully tackled. While carefully examining samples from international travellers, Indian samples were given priority for vaccine development.
Dr. Pragya Yadav, who is the Group Leader of the Maximum Containment Facility (BSL-4 Facility) and is recognized for her contribution to the development of COVID-19 vaccines in India, has consistently excelled under pressure. He has also received the Bharat Bhagya Vidhata Samman Award for isolating the SARS-CoV-2 virus and conducting important animal studies.
Over nearly two decades, Yadav, who left her home in Uttar Pradesh to pursue a doctoral degree from Pune University and later joined ICMR-NIV, has built a biosafety level (BSL)-4 laboratory at the institute’s Pashan campus. Has played an important role in the establishment of. , Dr. Yadav is a member of teams investigating India’s preparedness for the threat of Ebola and yellow fever, as well as various outbreaks of emerging and re-emerging viruses such as Nipah, Zika, SARS-CoV-2 and most recently monkeypox. Have also been. ,
Dr. Gangakhedkar recalls how these women scientists had to make sacrifices on the personal front. For example, Dr. Abraham lived alone in Pune and had to juggle both professional and personal responsibilities. Dr. Gangakhedkar also saluted those who remained behind the scenes but played a huge role in the pandemic.
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For example, Dr. Smita Mahale, as director of the National Institute for Research in Reproductive and Child Health, will set up a testing laboratory in a parking basement in Mumbai to test 10,000 samples a day or Dr. Shalini Singh, Will be the director. of the National Institute of Cancer Prevention and Research, Noida, who will conduct a similar exercise. The dynamic Dr. Kathiresan Jayashree at the National Institute of Epidemiology, Chennai did not hesitate to step inside the Covid wards and conduct field studies,” says Dr. Gangakhedkar said.
A special edition of ICMR (e-Samvad- 2021) states that women scientists have expanded the scope of research at an unprecedented pace. Be it Dr. Sheela Godbole, current Director of ICMR-NARI and also Director of ICMR-NIV, who responded to the need to generate evidence on treatment options for COVID 19 and ICMR-WHO solidarity at the national level. Successfully led the trial. Coordinator Dr Roli Mathur, a scientist at the National Center for Disease Informatics and Research, Bengaluru, who developed ethical guidelines for conducting research during the public health emergency in collaboration with the late Dr Vasanth Muthuswamy and Dr Nandini Kumar of ICMR, along with several scientists Has been appreciated. For his leading roles across the country.
“Examples are just a few, but there are many like Dr. Srilakshmi Mohandas, scientist and veterinarian at NIV, or Dr. Anita Shete-Aich, scientist at NIV’s BSL-4 laboratory – who are among the bright unsung women scientists. They are the future of India,” said Dr. Gangakhedkar.