Millions of COVID vaccines unsold; stopped manufacturing since December 2021: Adar Poonawalla

By PTI

MUMBAI: The Serum Institute of India has stopped producing the COVID-19 vaccine because the final day of December 2021 because it has been sitting on thousands and thousands of unsold vaccines after the vaccination momentum has ebbed, its chief govt officer Adar Poonawalla mentioned on Friday.

Poonawalla additionally warned in opposition to the return to “the business as usual” strategy of the administration within the nationwide capital, saying “we can’t afford to put a price tag on the life of a citizen” because the pandemic is “not behind us yet nor we know by when it will be”.

He additionally referred to as for dashing up the choice to vaccinate younger children and mentioned if they are often given different immunisation vaccines why not for the COVID-19, the top of which no person is aware of as of now.

“Since the vaccine intake has been coming down, there has been a lot of unsold inventories with us. We stopped production on December 31, 2021. Currently, we are sitting on over 200 million doses. I have offered this to anyone willing to pick them up for free. But there hasn’t been a good response to that also. Seems there is vaccine fatigue among the people now as even after the price was slashed to Rs 225, there has been no major uptake,” Poonawalla mentioned on the Times Network India Economic Conclave.

Defending his name for decreasing the hole between second and third doses to 6 months from 9 months at current, he mentioned it is wanted for one “we can’t put a price tag on the life of a person be it an adult or a child. Another important reason is that after six months the antibodies come down so it is better to go for the third dose within six months”.

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“This is something many studies have verified and therefore many foreign governments have made the booster dose mandatory. Already, many counties have made booster doses mandatory for travel. This means those who were vaccinated by August or September last will not be able to travel outside the country. Therefore, my suggestion to the government for six months gap for the third dose,” he mentioned.

On the necessity for vaccinating children within the 5-11 age bracket, he mentioned, “My point is we can’t put a price tag on the life of a person. Also if an additional dose of vaccine can prevent a 1,000 hospitalisation, so let’s do that as was evident from the third wave.”

On the delays in determination making, Poonawalla rued that it appears the urgency is not there. Unfortunately for the important thing people who find themselves presupposed to be taking choices on time, the committees presupposed to be assembly on time, it appears there is no such thing as a urgency any longer.

“The momentum of the past that brought us so far here is lost. As you said it seems for them, it’s business as usual. That’s why there is no decision on the emergency use of Covovax is coming in. What is more surprising is that the same vaccine has been approved by the regulator long ago and have also been in use in many European nations and in Australia,” he mentioned.

However, Poonawalla shortly added that the federal government on the highest degree is totally seized of the matter, however “yes at the ground level there seems the urgency is lost”.