India’s first indigenously developed vaccine for treating cervical cancer will be priced between Rs 200 to Rs 400, announced Serum Institute of India (SII) CEO Adar Poonawala on Thursday.

He said, “The vaccine for cervical cancer will be available in a few months. We will announce the price in a few months. It may be priced between Rs 200-400 but prices are yet to be finalised. We will finalise after manufacturing and discussion with the Government of India.”

The SII and the Department of Biotechnology (DBT) launched India's first indigenously developed Quadrivalent Human Papillomavirus vaccine (qHPV) against cervical cancer today.

This vaccine will be the light in the path of managing cervical cancer which is the fourth most common cancer in women.

According to officials, the qHPV vaccine CERVAVAC has demonstrated robust antibody response that is nearly 1,000 times higher than the baseline against all targeted HPV types and in all dose and age groups.

This form of cancer develops in a woman's cervix. As per the data of the World Health Organisation (WHO), in 2018, an estimated 5,70,000 women were diagnosed with cervical cancer worldwide and about 3,11,000 women died from the disease.