The country is back to administering 20 lakh doses of Covid-19 vaccines per day and this will increase further.
By July, there would be a total of 51.6 crore doses, VK Paul, member, health, Niti Aayog and chair of the National Expert Group on Vaccine Administration for Covid-19, said. He said the government was doing everything to increase development, production and supply of ‘made in India’ vaccines.
All the vaccine manufacturers were increasing their monthly capacities to inoculate maximum number of people. Bharat Biotech started with 99 lakh doses of COVAXIN a month, which is expected to reach 10 crore per month by September or October. Serum Institute is ramping up Covishield production from 6.5 crore doses per month dose level to 11 crore doses per per month.
Additionally, three PSUs — Haffkine Biopharmaceutical Corporation, Mumbai, Bharat Immunologicals and Biologicals Corporation, Bulandshahr and Indian Immunologicals, Hyderabad — will together aim to produce up to four crore doses of COVAXIN by December.
Russia has already sent two tranches of vaccines and also accomplished tech-transfer to Indian companies that would start manufacturing very soon. The Sputnik vaccine will be manufactured by six companies coordinated by Dr Reddy’s.
There was also steady progress being made in the development of Zydus Cadila, BioE and Gennova vaccine.
Development of Bharat Biotech’s single dose intranasal vaccine was proceeding well with government funding, and it could be a game-changer for the world, Paul said.
He said that vaccine availability was going to increase in the near future and much more supply would be possible. The estimated production of over 200 crore doses by the vaccine industry by the end of 2021 would be the result of these efforts, he said.
Paul said the country was on the downswing of the second wave of the pandemic and he hoped it would be sustained. It would be sustained even when the restrictions were gently, systematically and cautiously opened up , he said.