Bangalore, Aug 22 - A leading virologist has raised concern about the safety of the swine flu vaccine that Indian companies are trying to bring out in a hurry at the request of the government.

Health Minister Ghulam Nabi Azad had said on Aug 10 that the Serum Institute in Pune, Bharat Biotech in Hyderabad and Panacea Biotech in New Delhi are working to develop the vaccine from A (H1N1) virus strains supplied by the World Health Organisation.

Azad had said that the Indian Council for Medical Research has been asked to help the companies to ensure fast-track production of the vaccines. The Serum Institute has started animal trials and expects to bring out the vaccine as early as next month.

'The companies that have been entrusted with the manufacture of influenza vaccine have no experience to manufacture and evaluate a totally new vaccine and that too in such a short time,' Kalyan Banerjee, former director of the National Institute of Virology (NIV) in Pune, told IANS in an e-mail interview.

The companies do have experience to manufacture well tested and established vaccines but not a totally new vaccine, he cautioned.

Banerjee surmised that the vaccine would be manufactured in 'embryonated' hen's eggs.

'Such a vaccine has been used for strains circulating in different years and are of limited use. I wonder whether extensive safety and immunogenic data are available,' Banerjee said.

'As desired by the government, the vaccine manufactured by these companies would be for a mass vaccination campaign. I would certainly not get myself vaccinated unless extensive safety and immunogenic data are available and risk benefit ratio is impartially analysed,' he added.

Banerjee also questioned the purpose of the H1N1 vaccine.

'By the time the vaccine is well studied and found fit for mass use, the epidemiology of influenza would suggest emergence of a new strain.