Delhi Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal on Tuesday suggested to the Central government that it should share the COVID-19 vaccine formula of Serum Institute of India and Bharat Biotech with other firms in the country in order to scale up production of the coronavirus jab.
The Delhi Chief Minister stated that there is a shortage of COVID-19 vaccine doses across India. Kejriwal added that there is an urgent need for the country to scale up its manufacturing on a war footing. Kejriwal explained that vaccine production should be ramped up while developing a national policy for administering the jab to everyone in the next few months.
"Only 2 companies are producing vaccines. They produce only 6-7 crore vaccines a month. This way, it'll take over 2 yrs to vaccinate everyone. Many waves would've come by then. Important to increase vaccine production on war footing & frame national plan to vaccinate all," said Kejriwal.
Arvind Kejriwal has urged the Narendra Modi-led Central government to ensure that all vaccine production units in the country start manufacturing the COVID-19 jab.
He added that the two COVID vaccine manufacturers - SII and Bharat Biotech - can be awarded royalty for use of their formula by other companies. Kejriwal explained that the ramping up COVID-19 vaccine production is needed for inoculating everyone before the next wave of the coronavirus pandemic hits the country.
"Not just 2, several companies should be deployed to produce vaccines. Centre should collect the formula to produce vaccines from these 2 companies & give it to all those companies that can produce vaccine safely. Centre has the power to do this in these difficult times," the Chief Minister added.
Meanwhile, India reported over 3.29 lakh new COVID-19 cases and 3,876 deaths in the last 24 hours. More than 3.56 lakh people recovered from the infection, as per the Union Health Ministry update issued on Tuesday morning. India's total COVID-19 case count currently stands at 2.29 crore while 1.90 crore people have recovered from the deadly virus.
Delhi recorded 12,651 fresh cases of COVID-19 in the past 24 hours. The national capital also reported 319 COVID-19 related deaths and 13,306 recoveries in the past 24 hours. The number of active cases in Delhi now stands at 85,258.
(Edited by Mohammad Haaris Beg)
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