India is the second most populous nation and largest producer of Covid-19 vaccines in the world, due to the fact that it is home to the Serum Institute of India (SII) – a biotechnology and pharmaceutical company responsible for 60% of the entire supply of vaccines around the world, according to a CNN report.
But recent restrictions in the United States and Europe on the export of critical Covid-19 vaccine production materials have led to a severe shortage of vaccines across the country. Many of its nearly 1.4 billion people now find themselves forced to wait for shots during a second deadly wave of coronavirus.
India reported a record 261,500 new cases on Sunday, the highest figure since the pandemic began. The country also added a million new cases in less than a week, reaching a total of more than 14 million cases.
The growth has forced India to return to the blockade, with Delhi, the country’s capital region, imposing night and weekend shutdowns to limit the spread of the virus.
India is also a major manufacturer supplying COVAX, the international production and distribution agreement Covid-19. SII was initially committed to producing up to 200 million doses for 92 countries. These plans are currently pending.
“Dose delivery from the Serum Institute of India will be postponed to March and April,” said a March 25 statement by COVAX, which is led by a coalition that includes the World Health Organization. “Delays in providing supplies of Covid-19 vaccine doses produced by IBS are due to increased demand for Covid-19 vaccines in India.”
SII has an agreement for the manufacture of the AstraZeneca vaccine, as well as a homemade vaccine called Covaxin. It has already delivered 28 million doses for COVAX distribution and was scheduled to deliver another 40 million doses in April and 50 million in May, according to a CNN report.
However, in January, the Indian government restricted the export of their doses of AstraZeneca, a decision that John Nkengasong, director of the African Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, called “catastrophic” for Africa in early April. The continent has been set to obtain a large share of its COVAX vaccine supply.
When India began its vaccination program in January, it set a goal to fully vaccinate 300 million people by the end of August, but so far, only 16 million people have received full doses, just over 1 % of the country’s population, according to data from Johns Hopkins University.
US and European export limits affect India’s supply
In early February, President Joe Biden invoked the U.S. Defense Production Act to limit the export of production supplies needed for Covid-19 vaccine production. At the time, the White House said it was using the act to help pharmaceutical giant Merck step up production of Johnson & Johnson, whose distribution in the U.S. was recently suspended to examine a very limited number of potentially harmful side effects. in rare cases.
At the end of March, the European Union set similar export limits to help increase European vaccine production. Together, the two export bans mainly affected IBS.
“There are a lot of bags, filters and critical items that manufacturers need,” SII CEO Adar Poonawalla told Reuters in early March. “Novavax, a major manufacturer, needs these items in the United States.”
Export bans have a direct effect on global vaccine production as the world begins to face a particularly deadly wave of new Covid-19 variants. On Saturday, the world passed 3 million deaths caused by the virus.
But not everyone in the Indian government blames only export limits. Both the Indian Minister of Health, Harsh Vardhan, and the Minister of the Interior, Amit Shah, claimed that the country has the vaccines it needs and that the deficiencies come from poor planning in each state. In a statement on April 7, Vardhan chose Maharashtra – one of India’s most affected states in the pandemic – as particularly disorganized.
India intends to extend vaccine approval
Even with accusations against the states, the federal government may begin to feel some guilt or at least some responsibility. On Tuesday, India announced plans to accelerate emergency approvals for vaccines that have been approved elsewhere by the WHO but are not currently administered in the country. These include Pfizer / BioNTech, Johnson & Johnson, Novavax and Moderna.
But there is still a long way to go, and despite the mudslide between state subsidiaries and the federal government in India, it is clear that the main cause of the deficit probably comes from export limits. As richer EU and North American countries begin to get over the virus and their vaccination programs accelerate the administration of the necessary doses – the US has delivered more than 209 million doses of vaccine since Sunday – the rest of the world seems to be lagging behind.
Vaccination centers in India have been forced to close due to lack of doses, and the global supply chain will appear tense until material exports begin to flow from the West.