Delhi Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal, in a letter to Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Tuesday, requested the Centre to allow more companies in India to manufacture COVID-19 vaccination by directing the two companies currently engaged in manufacturing it to share the formula with others.
Mr. Kejriwal said the Centre should formulate a national policy to vaccinate every person within the next few months by increasing vaccine production, though the second wave is abating.
‘End duopoly’
“Right now we are administering 1.25 lakh doses of vaccine every day. Soon we will start administering vaccines to more than 3 lakh people every day. But a major problem is the shortage of vaccines. We have only a few days of vaccine left in Delhi and this problem is being faced countrywide,” he also said.
He said only two companies are manufacturing the vaccines and, together, made only 6-7 crore vaccines per month. If things were to continue like this, vaccinating the entire country would take more than two years.
“Till then we don’t even know how many [COVID] waves will come and how much destruction we will have to face. Thus we must increase the production of vaccines in India and formulate a national policy to vaccinate every person within the next few months. Unless everyone is vaccinated, the battle cannot be won,” he said.
“The Central government should take the formula for producing the vaccine from these two companies and give it to all those companies which can safely make the vaccines,” he added.
In these difficult times, the Chief Minister said, the Centre had the power to execute this. It could make the vaccine-producing formula available to companies that want to make the vaccines.
“If you remember, when we faced the first wave, there was a shortage for PPE kits. Today, many Indian companies are making PPE kits. That is why we are not dependent on others. India houses some of the greatest industrialists and we have some of the biggest pharma companies in the world,” he said.