New Delhi: The National Expert Group on Vaccine Administration for Covid19 (NEGVAC) on Saturday held a review meeting on the progress of India's vaccine trial in New Delhi.
Officials privy to the meeting told ETV Bharat that the group headed by Niti Aayog member Dr VK Paul also took stock of India's preparedness for vaccination, expected early next year.
"NEGAV also had a video conferencing with a few state governments over their preparedness for the mammoth exercise of vaccination," officials said.
It may be mentioned here that India's drug regulator, DCGI is examining the trial report of three Covid19 vaccine manufacturers who have applied for emergency use authorisation (EUA) of their vaccine.
Serum Institute of India (SII), Bharat Biotech and Pfizer have approached DCGI for EUA.
Meanwhile, the World Health Organisation (WHO) has said that the end of the pandemic is in sight but we must not let our guard down.
The world health watchdog further said that the vaccine reservoir COVAX, a 190 country international initiative that seeks to ensure all countries have equal access to Coronavirous vaccine, can plan to start delivering the shots in the first quarter of 2021.
COVAX is a global initiative by WHO and GAVI that aims at equal distributions of Covid19 vaccine among member countries across the world to strike a balance among the rich and poor. India is also a partner in COVAX.
COVAX has agreements in place to access nearly 2 billion does of several promising Covid19 vaccine candidates and has laid the groundwork for further doses to be secured through contributions from donors.
"By mid-year, it will have delivered enough doses to protect health and social care workers in all participating countries that have asked to get doses in that timeframe. All other participants should get sufficient doses to cover up to 20 per cent of their populations by the end of 2021, and further doses in 2022," WHO said.
Meanwhile, the UN Children's Fund (UNICEF) said it was ready to transport up to 850 tonnes of Covid19 vaccine per month in 2021, more than twice its usual payload of vaccines. " Most could be sent using existing commercial flights, but alternative options and charter flights would also be considered wherever necessary," it said.
"This is a mammoth and historic undertaking. The scale of the task is daunting, and the stakes have never been higher, but we are ready to take this on," said UNICEF executive director Henrietta Fore.
With the support of from the global vaccine alliance Gavi, UNICEF is procuring and supporting installations of 70,000 cold chain fridges in lower-income countries by the end of 2021, which will help in the rollout of Covid19 vaccines that need to be stored at 2 to 8 degrees Celsius.
Almost half of the fridges will be solar-powered, UNICEF said.
Meanwhile, Serum Institute of India (SII) CEO Adar Poonawalla said that his company has signed for 100 billion doses of Novavax and another 100 million doses of AstraZeneca-Oxford vaccines with COVAX, with an option of extending it by 900 million doses.
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