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When the deadly second wave of the Covid-19 Pandemic hit India, the government was underprepared, to say the least. Most developing countries struggled with access to vaccines, but India being the world’s largest vaccine maker, did not expect to be one of them.
Prime Minister Modi’s government was not early enough in ordering vaccines from vaccine makers. When the second wave hit, they were forced to quickly extend the vaccine drive to the entire adult population of India. As of June, the Supreme Court was told by the government that 1.35 billion doses would be made available between August and December but 1.8 billion doses were required to vaccinate the eligible adult population.
People between the ages of 18 and 44 are required to register themselves on CoWin, which is the Government of India’s online vaccination portal. As of May, vaccinations were opened up to 960 million eligible citizens, but the required supply of over 1.8 billion doses was nowhere close to being met.
According to Achal Prabhala, who is a coordinator for AccessIBSA, India could have pre-ordered vaccines much earlier but waited till January to order them. According to BBC, India purchased around 350 million doses between January and May but they were not enough to vaccinate even 20% of the population. Narendra Modi followed a policy of Vaccine Diplomacy after declaring that India had defeated Covid. By March, India was exporting more vaccines than were being given to the Indian citizens. Further, India waited till the end of April before extending $610 million in financing to the Serum Institute of India (SII) and Bharath Biotech. According to Malini Aisola, co-convener of the All India Drug Action Network, another mistake made by the government was leaving India’s diverse manufacturing potential unutilised. Many biologics factories could have been adapted to create vaccine production lines.
However, India has managed to change its fortunes. The current situation seems to be instilling hope back into the spirits of the citizens who were left hopeless after the second wave. On June 21st, India administered 9.2 million doses, setting a record and as of August 17th, new infections have been at their lowest since March 16th.
Between August 16 and 17, India gave 8.8 million jabs in only 24 hours. According to Reuters, India’s Covid-19 vaccine drive is one of the largest in the world with the country having administered over 554 million doses. In August, at least 46% of the 944 million adults that populate the country had been given the first dose and about 13% had been given the second one. 5 million jabs were given every day in the first two weeks of August. Although this data indicates an improving situation, experts say that India needs to inoculate 10 million people a day in order to achieve its goal of vaccinating all adults by the end of the year.
To mark the Prime Minister’s birthday, India administered 20 million vaccine doses on 17th September. As of September, more than 790 million doses have been administered with more than half the adult population vaccinated with the first dose and 20% fully vaccinated with two doses. The number of new cases per day has also fallen considerably with less than 40,000 cases being reported in a day.
This change of fate can be credited to the SII overshooting the government’s ambitious projection for the number of doses that could be manufactured. SII supplied 200 million doses of the Covishield brand of the AstraZeneca vaccine in September. In May, the government projected an output of 750 million doses between August and December but the actual number could cross 900 million. SII now has 5 production lines that manufacture Covishield as opposed to 2 in April.
Bharath Biotech, the company that manufactures India’s domestically made Covaxin shot, has claimed that their monthly production will rise to 100 million doses by December. Health Minister Mandavoya has said that he expects overall domestic vaccine production to cross 1 billion doses between October and December.
Recently, India approved a vaccine for the under 18 population. The ZyCoV-D vaccine manufactured by Cadila Healthcare is a three-dose vaccine and is the first vaccine that has been tested in young people in India. Prior to this, India was vaccinating using the earlier approved Covishield, Covaxin and Sputnik V. India has also approved the Johnson and Johnson vaccine for emergency use. This approval comes after a supply agreement with the company Biological E. India approved the import of the Moderna vaccine through Cipla but it will not be available in India till 2022 because of a supply crunch, according to BBC. SII is set to produce a new vaccine named Novavax.
Seeing the improvement in the vaccination drive in India, the government decided to start exporting vaccines again in the October- December quarter. The Health Minister has said that India will resume vaccine exports via COVAX while prioritising neighbouring countries. The vaccine export will help COVAX, which is fairly behind its goal of delivering 2 billion doses this year. COVAX is sponsored by GAVI (Global Alliance for Vaccines and Immunisations), CEPI (Coalition for Epidemic Preparedness Innovations), the WHO and UNICEF. These organisations reduced COVAX’s targeted supply by 30%. According to a GAVI spokesperson, this step could have a significantly desirable effect on India’s health security, as well as the world’s.
India’s decision to resume vaccine exports has been met positively in dependent nations. At the same time, India has a steady and sufficient supply of vaccines for its own citizens, now that Indian companies have the resources to produce approximately 3 billion vaccines doses a year.
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