Bharat Biotech will sell its Covaxin vaccine against the coronavirus to state governments at Rs 600 per dose and private hospitals at Rs 1200 per dose. In a statement, Bharat Biotech chairman and managing director Krishna Ella said the company is supplying the vaccine to the central government at Rs 150 per dosage and the government on its part is distributing it free of cost.
“We would like to state that more than 50 per cent of our capacities have been reserved for central government supplies,” Ella said. The indigenous vaccines would be exported at $15-20 per dose.
Ella said the recovery costs are essential in innovating vaccines such as intranasal COVID-19, Chikungunya, Zica, Cholera and others.
Earlier this week, the vaccine maker had announced Covaxin has shown efficacy of 78 per cent against mild, moderate and severe cases of COVID-19, as per Phase III interim analysis results.
On Wednesday, Serum Institute of India said its Covishield vaccine will be sold at Rs 600 to private hospitals per dose and state governments Rs 400, a rate which will also apply to central government procurement once the existing contract for Rs 150 a dose ends, its chief executive said on Wednesday.
Of the 127,605,870 COVID-19 vaccination jabs administered till now, 11,60,65,107 are of Covishield, while 1,15,40,763 are Covaxin, according to the government’s CO-WIN portal. Earlier in the day, the government waived customs duty on the import of COVID vaccines as well as medical grade oxygen and related equipment as the nation battled its worst health crisis with a ‘tsunami’ of infections setting a new world record for cases for the third consecutive day.
The decision to exempt customs duty was taken at a meeting chaired by Prime Minister Narendra Modi to boost oxygen availability in the country. Customs duty waiver on imported vaccines would help to keep the cost of overseas vaccines low, that are being eyed to supplement domestically made shots ahead of the opening of COVID-19 vaccination to all citizens over 18 years of age.
The government had previously waived customs duty on imported Remdesivir injections and the drug’s active pharmaceutical ingredients (API) to boost supplies. India reported a record 346,786 new infections on Saturday, bringing its total to 1.66 crore. Deaths also rose by a record 2,624 to total 189,544.
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