By Aditi Tandon/TNS
New Delhi, May 9
The government’s inquiry into linkages, if any, between the administration of HPV (Human Papilloma Virus) vaccine to seven adolescent tribal girls in Andhra Pradesh and Gujarat last year and their deaths has found serious lapses in the conduct of the said trial by partners-foreign NGO PATH and the Indian Council for Medical Research (ICMR).
Though proclaimed as a “post-licensure observational study of HPV vaccination against cancer of the cervix”, the project, suspended in April last following deaths, was indeed a clinical trial and needed to have followed protocols mandated by the Drugs and Cosmetics Act, 1954 which it didn’t, a government inquiry has concluded, without fixing anyone’s responsibility despite evidence of violation by PATH and ICMR members.
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