The vials have reached the states and India is all set to embark upon its Covid-19 vaccination drive that will first target the country’s 3...
The vials have reached the states and India is all set to embark upon its Covid-19 vaccination drive that will first target the country’s 30 million frontline workers. Strikingly, a quarter of those vials are from Bharat Biotech, the Indian manufacturer behind the Covaxin vaccine, which lacks large-scale safety and efficacy data since its phase three clinical trials are incomplete.
Many health policy experts say the government’s decision to procure such a large consignment from Bharat Biotech at this stage is baffling, particularly since Covaxin is priced higher than the other vaccine at India’s disposal: Oxford-AstraZeneca’s Covishield. Manufactured by the Pune-based Serum Institute, the vaccine’s India-specific trial data are yet to be fully examined, but it has shown favourable results in large scale trials in Brazil and the United Kingdom.
The Indian government has purchased 11 million doses of Covishield for the price of Rs 200 per dose. In contrast, it has paid Rs 295 per dose for 3.85 million doses of Covaxin. Bharat Biotech has offered to supply 1.65 million doses for free as a “special gesture” to the government. Despite the free doses, the cost per dose of Covaxin comes to Rs 206, higher than Covishield.
Indranil Mukhopadhyay, a health economist who teaches at the...
