Three companies developing vaccines for Covid-19 have approached India’s regulator CDSCO for emergency use authorisation. One of them, Pfizer/ BioNTech, which is using the unique mRNA platform to catalyse the body’s defence mechanism, has already received permission in the UK. The other two applicants are Indian vaccine maker Serum Institute working with AstraZeneca and Oxford University, and Bharat Biotech co-developing the indigenous vaccine Covaxin with ICMR. This is the most hopeful development in a long while. We are now on the threshold of the next stage in the battle against coronavirus, which should enable the return to normalcy.
Serum has indicated to the media that it expects to supply its vaccines to both the government and the private sector. Distribution through all available channels is important. It will enable speed of vaccination, which must be the top priority henceforth. This is because vaccination has a non-linear or disproportionately large impact in the battle against Covid. Anyone can become a super-spreader. Therefore, the faster the vaccination exercise is rolled out, the greater the level of protection for the entire country.
There are at least eight vaccine candidates in different stages of clinical trials in India. The government, with its existing distribution infrastructure to annually vaccinate more than 30 million children and pregnant women under the Universal Immunisation Programme, will naturally be the key player. It’s only natural that most of the Covid vaccination under this will be fully or at least partially subsidised. To both concentrate government’s scarce resources where they’re needed and to spread the net of safety, a market system of vaccination should be allowed to work in the private sector. Ready availability there will also lessen malfeasance in the subsidised public sector distribution chain.
The Centre and states may have had an extraordinarily tough job on hand when the Covid pandemic hit the country in March. But the manner in which the initial lockdown was handled, as well as the almost chaotic approach of states subsequently, reflected poorly on India’s governance quality. Authorities need to get it right this time, as the next phase will require even greater coordination between the Centre and states. This is essential to reducing the suffering and restoring economic normalcy quickly, thereby making some restitution for a lost year. It’s important for both sides to keep channels of communication open, and devise a plan to expand the qualified personnel to administer the vaccine by rapidly skilling students of medicine and nursing.
This piece appeared as an editorial opinion in the print edition of The Times of India.
Top Comment
Ashok
2 hours ago
The market is large enough to accommodate several safe, efficacious vaccines. Pfizer has a world class product, which many well off Indians would be happy to use. Considering Indian conditions, the Serum Institute vaccine will be best suited for mass procurement by the Central / state governments, provide the mainstay of Indiaâ s mass vaccination programme. France and the United States have announced that free vaccine will be available to all citizens. India - with one twentieth of their per capita income - should do the same. Whether all Indians need to be vaccinated or one fourth is good enough should conform to medical science and global best practices. Personally one is not a great fan of ICMR. 2. 2020 has been a year of living dangerously for the human race. As it ends, the coronavirus is neither tired nor retired. California has announced virtually a complete lockdown. We bow to all the scientists and researchers who have beaten the clock to produce these wonderful, life saving vaccines. The government system must get right on top of the mass vaccination programme. That would also be its best - some would say sole - stimulus to the economy.... Read More