India joins the fight against the Pandemic

The pandemic is almost one year old in the UK. It was in January last year that I first became conscious of Covid-19.  Until then, knowledge of it was from newspaper reports about suffering it was causing in Wuhan, China.  About a year ago, as I was walking down Oxford Street with a friend visiting from India, we passed a group of tourists from the far-east.  They stood out as they were wearing masks, a somewhat unusual sight in London those days. One of them suddenly had a vicious bout of coughing, prompting a fearful comment from my friend about Covid-19. The moment is now etched in my memory, though I remember laughing it off at that time. One year later, with almost 86 million cases and over 1.85 million deaths globally, masked faces are no longer out of place; tourists and large crowds are more likely to raise eye brows.

The new variant of the virus found in UK and several other countries has added a new sense of urgency to the fight against the pandemic. Some cases of the new variant have also been found in India.  Aggressive contact tracing and isolation of the affected persons may avert a major surge of cases in India by the more infectious version of this virus.  Expedited and swift vaccination, starting with frontline workers to the more vulnerable categories, moving to rest of the population, seems the only possible way to put a break on this virus caused roller coaster that our world is currently going through.It is in this scenario that the approval in India for two vaccines, Covishield and Covaxin, for restricted use against Covid 19 has opened the way for mass vaccination against this virus in India. The Oxford-AstraZeneca Covid-19 vaccine, produced by Serum Institute of India (SII) is called Covishield in India. While some questions have been raised about the approval process for Covaxin, the indigenously produced vaccine by Bharat Biotech International Limited, has been defended by Chairman and MD of this Hyderabad based Indian biotechnology company, engaged in drug discovery, drug development, manufacture of vaccines, bio-therapeutics, pharmaceuticals and health care products.It has been reported that SII’s Covishield will be given at Rs 250 (£2.51) to the government and will be available in the private market in India for Rs 1,000 (£10.51). It is cheaper than the vaccine developed by Pfizer-BioNTech and its transportation is easier. SII is based in Pune and is said to be making 50-60 million doses of the Oxford-AstraZeneca vaccine every month. The UK has earlier approved the Pfizer and Moderna vaccines and started vaccination of its frontline workers.  Recently, it has also granted approval for the Oxford-AstraZeneca vaccine. With the new variant of the virus leading to rising cases in the UK and tougher lockdowns being resorted to, the Oxford-AstraZeneca and SII vaccine would add to the massive vaccination effort.The Pune based SII is now the world’s largest vaccine producer.  It is estimated that about 65% of world’s children receive at least one vaccine manufactured by Serum Institute in around 170 countries through their respective national immunisation programmes. SII vaccines are accredited by the World Health Organization and save millions of lives throughout the world.  SII has tied up with AstraZeneca to develop Covidshield in India and produce over 1 billion such vaccines. It is, thus, expected to play a vital role in the global fight against the pandemic. The pandemic has highlighted the resilience of Indian pharmaceutical industry. Not only did this industry ensure that there were no shortages of medicines in India, it enabled India to send out supplies of essential drugs like paracetamol and hydroxychloroquine to a large number of countries around the world, including USA and the UK. The phrase ‘Pharmacy of the World’ is increasingly being used for India. The problem of the Covid 19 pandemic originated with the coronavirus in China and has since ravaged large parts of the globe and the global economy. Like the UK, India had no part in the creation of the pandemic, but together through the vaccine and other lifesaving medicines, we can be a part of the solution!