VACCINE MAITRI
Indian government had started providing vaccines since January 20, 2021. As of 9 April 2021, India had delivered around 64.5 million doses of vaccines to 85 countries. Of these, 10.5 million doses were gifted to 45 countries by the Government of India. The remaining 54 million were supplied by the Serum Institute of India under its commercial and COVAX obligations.
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| Countries where Indian made Covaxin is used |
Developed in record time, the dozen or so Covid-19 vaccines already in use around the world have already triggered an exponential increase in production, meaning raw materials are now running short. SII, which struck a deal to supply 200 million doses to Covax, a World Health Organization-backed effort to procure and distribute inoculations to poor countries, has seen its profile soar since the pandemic, with rich nations also clamouring to buy its jab.
Shortage of raw material for manufacturing the vaccine
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| Adar Poonawalla |
Adar Poonawalla had said earlier that the US has implemented the Defence Act that bans export of raw materials leading to difficulties to several vaccine manufacturers. In a letter to Commerce Secretary Anup Wadhawan and Foreign Secretary Harsh Vardhan Shringla, Director, Government and Regulatory Affairs at Pune-based SII, Prakash Kumar Singh said the US government has invoked the Defence Production Act because of which the firm is facing difficulties in importing necessary products like cell culture medias, raw material, single-use tubing assemblies and some specialty chemicals from the US.
On January 21, 2021, President Joe Biden invoked the Defense Production act on his second day in office to increase production of supplies related to the pandemic, such as protective equipment. On March 2, President Biden invoked the DPA again to supply equipment to Merck facilities needed to safely manufacture Johnson & Johnson vaccines.
Through the Defence production Act, the US government has established two prioritizing systems, Defence Priorities and Allocations System Program (DPAS) and Health Resources Priority and Allocations System (HRPAS). The HRPAS has two principal components i.e. priorities and allocations.
Under the priority component, certain contracts between the government and private parties or between private parties for the production or delivery of industrial resources required to produce COVID-19 vaccine will be given priority over other contracts to facilitate expedited delivery in promotion of the US, National defence .
SERUM INSTITUTE OF INDIA
The raw materials that SII imports from the US include filters, bags, and adjuvant. An adjuvant is a substance that is used to increase the efficacy of a vaccine and helps the immune system generate antibodies. The disruption in the supply of adjuvant could hamper the production of vaccines for a longer period.
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