PremiumThe Drugs Controller General of India (DCGI) on Sunday said that the Serum Institute of India has produced 10 crore doses of its Covid vaccine, Covishield in June, so far. According to DCGI, the Pune-based Serum Institute sent 45 batches of Covishield, amounting to 10.80 crore doses to the Central Drugs Laboratory, Kasauli in June.
Last month, the firm's Director at Government and Regulatory Affairs, Prakash Kumar Singh met Union Home Minister Amit Shah and had told that Covishield production would be ramped up to 10 crore doses in June.
"We are committed to enhancing the production capacity of our Covishield vaccine and have been working round-the-clock in spite of various challenges being faced by us because of the COVID-19 pandemic.
"We are pleased to inform that in June we will be able to manufacture and supply nine to 10 crore doses of our Covishield vaccine to our country as compared to our present production capacity of 6.5 crore doses in May," Singh had said in a communication to Shah.
The vaccination drive has picked up pace in the country under the new phase of universalisation of Covid vaccination that commenced on June 21 with around 69 lakh vaccine doses being administered on an average daily in the last six days.
The immunisation data published at 7 am on Sunday showed that India administered 64.25 lakh vaccine doses in a day, taking the cumulative number of jabs given so far under the nationwide inoculation drive to 32.17 crore.
The nationwide vaccination drive has been ramped up through the availability of more vaccines, advanced visibility of vaccine availability to states and Union Territories enabling them to plan better, streamlining the vaccine supply chain, according to the Health Ministry.
Under the revised guidelines, vaccine doses are provided free of cost by the Centre. The Covid vaccines are allocated to states and Union Territories based on criteria such as population, disease burden, and the progress of vaccination. The Centre procures 75% of the vaccines being produced in the country.
The Centre had earlier allowed states and private hospitals to procure 50% of the vaccines following demands for decentralisation of the process. However, after several states complained of problems including funding, Prime Minister Narendra Modi revised vaccine guidelines this month.
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