With India remaining polio free for five years now, the government today said that it plans to switch to bivalent Oral Polio Vaccine (OPV) from its present trivalent version in "some months" Trivalent OPV contains live and weakened versions for all the three types (1, 2 and 3) of wild polio while the bivalent vaccine will contain type 1 and 3. Type 2 of wild polio virus has been eradicated worldwide long time back. India has already introduced injectable Inactivated Polio Vaccine (IPV) into its routine immunization programme along with oral polio vaccine (OPV) from November last year.
In the first phase, IPV has been introduced in Assam, Gujarat, Punjab, Bihar, Madhya Pradesh, and Uttar Pradesh. "We are also planning for switch from trivalent OPV to bivalent OPV in some months in a globally synchronized manner," Nadda said.
