Reduction of Covid-19 vaccine supplies in India hurting the world

The giant global Covid-19 vaccine producer is running out of the necessary jabs in its efforts to cope with the surging new infections.

More than 60% of the global Covid-19 vaccines are produced in India and sold across the globe, and this is equally the home of the world’s largest vaccine producer, Serum Institute of India (SII).    

This large manufacturing capability has catapulted India as a key player in the COVAX mix, the world vaccine sharing framework which offers vaccines at discounted prices or free for poor countries.  

The initial pact created last year established that SII would produce close to 200 million doses for almost 92 countries. However, the matrix has changed as the number of infections has surged. 

This comes on the heels of close to 274,000 new infections on Monday which has been touted as the highest on a single day, and a further 1, 619 deaths, equally the highest in close to 10 months. 

In the last five days India has recorded more than 1 million cases and by Monday had a total of 15 million cases, becoming second to the USA worldwide.

With these, the vaccine rations have reduced drastically amid the weekend and night curfews as the Indian federal government acting with speed.   

According to a report by the Johns Hopkins University, out of a population of close to 1.3 billion people, a paltry over 1% of the population has been vaccinated. 

Amid the increasing infections, the Indian government and SII changed their attention from supplying the vaccine to other countries to vaccinating the people at home. 

Consequently, the delays in the supply of the vaccine to other countries are likely to have adverse effects as other countries who were recipients of the opt for private imports of the vaccine to meet the increasing expectations.