NEW DELHI: Adar Poonawalla, CEO of Serum Institute of India (SII), on Monday said that regulatory approval for Covid-19 vaccine Covishield in India is expected in a “few days”.
The statement comes days after the company, the Indian manufacturing and clinical trial partner for the vaccine by Oxford University-AstraZeneca, submitted additional data to the Central Drugs Standards Control Organization for evaluation in follow up to its application for the emergency use authorisation of the vaccine.
Poonawalla, while launching the first indigenously developed pneumonia vaccine for children in India, also said that his firm was ready with a stockpile of about 40-50 million doses of Covishield.
Covishield is being tested on about 1,700 individuals in India as part of a multi-country phase 3 trial of the vaccine which has shown about 70% efficacy on an average in two different dosing regimens.
In response to a query on how much of the readied stockpile India will get, he said that “India has such a large population that we will probably end up giving the majority of those 50 million doses to India first.”
Poonawalla also said that after the company receives regulatory approvals “in a few days”, it will be down to the government to decide “how much they can take and how fast”.
Speaking about production targets, he said SII will be producing around 300 million doses of Covishield by July next year.
On the availability of Covishield in the coming months, Poonawalla said that the first six months of 2021 may see a shortage globally.
“Nobody can help that. But we will see easing off by August-September 2021 as other vaccine manufacturers also being able to supply,” he added.
Talking about the long-term supply of Covid-19 vaccine, Poonawalla said that as India is a part of ‘COVAX’ -- a vaccine alliance meant to ensure coronavirus vaccine to low- and middle-income countries—his company will keep supplying 50 % of its total production to India and to COVAX at the same time.