Govt sets up panel to find ways to boost Covid vaccine output

The government has constituted an inter-ministerial group to look at ways to augment Covid-19 vaccine manufacturing capacities in the country as the second wave of infection intensifies and authorities gear up to expand the eligibility criteria to include the 50-years-plus age group.
In a related development, the government on Monday also extended the interval for administering doses of Covishield to up to eight weeks from the current four to six weeks. This will allow the two doses to be spaced out and enable more people to receive the first jab. The gap for the two Covaxin shots will continue to be four weeks. The decision has been taken in view of emerging scientific evidence that the protection is enhanced if the second dose of Covishield is administered between 6 and 8 weeks.

India has seen a rapid spike in Covid cases in the last few weeks. While the stated position of the government is that there are enough shots to service the country’s immunisation drive, it is now looking at ways to scale up capacities to increase the daily number of vaccinations.

The inter-ministerial group, comprising officials from the health ministry, Department of Pharmaceuticals, Drugs Controller General of India (DCGI), Department of Biotechnology and Indian Council of Medical Research (ICMR), has been tasked to engage in regular dialogue with vaccine makers to facilitate rapid upscaling of domestic manufacturing capacities.


Reducing Covax Shipments
"The idea is to boost manufacturing capacity. The officials visited Serum Institute of India (SII) last week," said a senior government official.

To ensure "uninterrupted" supply in the country, it has also been decided that India will reduce shipments of Covid-19 vaccines for the Covax facility for one month, the official further said.

SII had recently told the Delhi High Court it can make 60 million doses a month. According to industry estimates, this number could go up to 80 million doses. Bharat Biotech’s monthly capacity is around 5 million doses.

"The vaccine manufacturers have been asked to ramp up vaccine production. By second half of the year, the annual capacity should increase to 2-2.5 billion doses per year," added the official.

The group of officials will visit Hyderabad-based Bharat Biotech this week. "Right now there is no worry about the vaccine supply. The group will ensure that there is no interruption," said Samiran Panda, scientist, ICMR, who is part of the group.

So far, India has administered over 47 million doses. The vaccination programme is at present confined to health workers, frontline workers, people over the age of 60 and those over 45 with specified co-morbidities. In the next phase, the government plans to expand the vaccination drive to the 50-60 age group.

"This is the next priority age group which is under consideration. This age group faces the maximum mortality and has to be targeted next," said a government official. According to estimates, over 150 million people fall under this age group.

Health Ministry to States

On Monday, the health ministry wrote to states asking them to administer the second Covishield dose to people within four to eight weeks, extending the gap between the doses from the current four to six weeks. People can now take the second dose any time between four to eight weeks of the first dose. The recommended interval between two doses is 12 weeks in UK and 16 weeks in Canada.

"In view of emerging scientific evidence, the interval between two doses of a specific Covid-19 vaccine i.e. Covishield, has been revisited by National Technical Advisory Group on Immunisation and subsequently by National Expert Group on Vaccine Administration for Covid-19," the central government said in its letter to the states.