Lack of clarity, rigour raise doubts over Covid-19 vaccine trials: Experts

The problem is that traditionally there has been poor scrutiny of clinical trials in India where often the emphasis is on cutting costs, said Arun Bhatt, former president of the ISCR

Jammi Nagaraj Rao, a UK-based public health physician and epidemiologist, has scanned through approximately 477 COVID-19 trials registered on India’s Clinical Trials Registry. Around 192 of these were observational studies, not multi-phase randomised clinical trials. And at least 53 were for traditional Indian remedies and homoeopathy.

“Many are badly designed and unlikely to set the world alight. Some are downright mischievous,” said Rao. He also advised special caution with the vaccine trials India is conducting: “With drug trials, a repurposed drug is being given to