The Vaccine Reality Check

Context: Centre’s grand claims of Covid immunisation are belied by poor coverage, vaccine unavailability and geographical disparities. It must course correct.

Issues with India’s vaccination strategy

• Poor Coverage: Till April 30, about 44% of the eligible population was atleast partially vaccinated, which translates into just 13.5% of the population above 18 years and just 9.2% of the total population.
  • In contrast, in the United States (50.4%), United Kingdom (43.3), Germany (26.7) and Brazil (13.7).
• Mismatch between target and availability: Given the intellectual property rights on vaccines and near-exclusive licenses for Serum Institute of India (SII) and Bharat Biotech (BB), India’s production capacity was only about 25.3 lakh doses per day in April.
  • Availability for states is likely to be much less than 30% of the total production.
  • If there is intense competition between states over this small quantity, the already existing inter-state disparity may only exacerbate.
• Geographical disparities in coverage: The average doses administered per healthcare worker in India was 2.2. The following data corresponds to Phase 1 of vaccination.
  • Several states administered at rates above the national average: Jharkhand (17.8), Chhattisgarh (8.2), Gujarat (2.8), Madhya Pradesh (2.5), Bihar (2.8), Odisha (2.7) and Haryana (2.4).
  • Several other states administered at rates far below the national average: Tamil Nadu (0.5), Andhra Pradesh and Kerala (1.2), and Karnataka and Maharashtra (1.5).
• Bleak future prospects:
  • To vaccinate everyone above 18 twice by January 2022, India would need at least 69 lakh doses per day.
  • At an average rate of 25 lakh doses per day, India would cover less than 30% of the 18-plus population by January 2022.
  • Further, at the current rate, it would be 2023 till India can vaccinate everyone above 18 years.

 Way forward:

• Retreat from the commercialisation of vaccine policy and consider compulsory licensing and mass production of vaccines.
• Procure the vaccines directly from manufacturers and provide these free of cost to states.
• Develop a transparent and socially desirable formula to be used to distribute vaccines to states.