On Wednesday, Tamil Nadu became 11th state in India to opt for floating of global tenders to get Covid-19 vaccines, even as states which have decided to opt for global tenders lack clarity on when they would receive these additional doses of vaccines and have cut back on plans to vaccinate those in the 18-45 age bracket in the wake of vaccine shortage.
Conversations with officials across the states indicate that most states are not very confident of getting the vaccines from international players soon as only those manufacturers who have been approved by Drug Controller of India can supply vaccines.
States are also facing an additional challenge — most international vaccine manufacturers already have made supply commitments to domestic governments or other countries, which may have made advance bookings.
Officials also said the only possible way to deal with vaccine shortage is to remove the patents and allow government-run public sector undertakings (PSUs) to manufacture the vaccines in large numbers to meet the domestic demand for vaccination to all above 18 years of age. They, however, said even if the patents are removed now, PSUs would take at least a few months to produce first batch of vaccines
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