{"id":62693,"date":"2021-02-24T14:30:27","date_gmt":"2021-02-24T03:30:27","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.aspistrategist.ru\/?p=62693"},"modified":"2021-02-24T13:38:37","modified_gmt":"2021-02-24T02:38:37","slug":"indias-push-to-be-the-worlds-covid-19-vaccine-pharmacy","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.aspistrategist.ru\/indias-push-to-be-the-worlds-covid-19-vaccine-pharmacy\/","title":{"rendered":"India\u2019s push to be the world\u2019s Covid-19 vaccine pharmacy"},"content":{"rendered":"
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On 23 February, India accounted for 11 million of the world\u2019s 112 million Covid-19 cases and 156,498 of 2,848,247 world deaths. Only the US had more cases and the US, Brazil and Mexico have recorded more deaths than India. Yet India\u2019s Covid mortality rate of 113 deaths per million\u2014only 35% of the global average of 319\u2014places it 112th of 221 countries and other locations (including, for example, the cruise ship Diamond Princess<\/em>) covered by Worldometers<\/a>.<\/p>\n

I discussed India\u2019s Covid situation in the global context in an academic article<\/a> in January. What\u2019s interesting since then is the extent to which India is suddenly attracting<\/a> world<\/a> attention<\/a>. One component of this is the surprisingly low mortality rate considering the many adverse initial conditions in the country.<\/p>\n

The second is the overdue recognition that India is a vaccine superpower with a US$42\u00a0billion pharmaceutical sector, including US$20\u00a0billion worth of exports<\/a> in 2019\u201320, a point I alluded to in a Strategist<\/em> article<\/a> in June. In combination with the country\u2019s emphasis on vaccine affordability and access, this gives India the potential to be the pharmacy to the world.<\/p>\n

It also gave India the self-confidence to refuse emergency-use authorisation for the Pfizer vaccine, based on trials in Germany and the US, unless it met the Indian regulator\u2019s demand for a local safety and immunogenicity study as a \u2018bridging trial\u2019. Pfizer withdrew<\/a> its application.<\/p>\n

As with everything else, India does things by scale. In January, the BBC<\/a> noted that India produces 60% of world vaccines by number of doses. The Guardian<\/em><\/a> published an interview with Adar Poonawalla, CEO of the Serum Institute of India, the single largest manufacturer of Covid vaccines in the world by volume, on 14 February. It expects to be making 100\u00a0million doses per month by the end of March. Another company, Bharat Biotech, has the goal of making 200\u00a0million vaccines annually.<\/p>\n

Matching India\u2019s impressive private-sector manufacturing capacity scaled up to meet world needs is the emerging character of India\u2019s vaccine diplomacy. The key consideration driving the country\u2019s vaccine exports is a careful balance between world needs and demand. This echoes the government\u2019s commitment to prioritise the poor, the vulnerable and the frontline workers in the domestic vaccination drive.<\/p>\n

India has enormous experience in implementing mass-vaccination programs for smallpox, tuberculosis, polio and other illnesses. At full stretch, India will be vaccinating 85 million people per month. By 22 February, in 38 days India had vaccinated 11 million people<\/a>. The goal is to cover 300\u00a0million people by the end of July.<\/p>\n

India\u2019s donations to neighbouring countries Nepal, Bangladesh, Sri Lanka, Maldives and Bhutan are nearing 6\u00a0million doses. India has pledged another 10\u00a0million doses to Africa and 1 million to UN health workers. As Indian vaccines arrived in Johannesburg, Foreign Minister S. Jaishankar tweeted<\/a> on 2 February: \u2018In it together. Made in India vaccines land in Johannesburg, South Africa. #VaccineMaitri\u2019 (maitri<\/em> means friendship.) Afghanistan, Myanmar, Mauritius, the Seychelles, Kuwait, Morocco and Brazil are also in queue.<\/p>\n

Meanwhile, Pakistan has been the beneficiary of Chinese largesse with a donation of 1 million doses of the Sinopharm vaccine<\/a> in two consignments. At the virtual meeting of the World Health Assembly on 18 May, President Xi Jinping affirmed<\/a> that a coronavirus vaccine would be \u2018a global public good\u2019 and represent \u2018China\u2019s contribution to ensuring vaccine accessibility and affordability in developing countries\u2019.<\/p>\n

It\u2019s worth noting that this language is a challenge to the big (by market capitalisation) Western pharmaceutical firms\u2019 drive to enforce intellectual property rights on all countries. China and India have been the leaders against that, arguing for affordable access for the people of poor countries as a higher priority.<\/p>\n

Peter J. Hotez<\/a>, co-director of the Center for Vaccine Development at Texas Children\u2019s Hospital and a former science envoy in the Obama administration, argues that compared to China and Russia, India\u2019s approach is \u2018more of a pure expression of true \u201cvaccine diplomacy\u201d\u2019. \u2018The likelihood is that India is going to rescue the world in making low-cost high-quality vaccines available and responding quickly to the new variant to adjust their vaccines accordingly.\u2019 By contrast, China seems more intent on linking exports to exerting political influence, he said.<\/p>\n

Duke University\u2019s Global Health Institute<\/a> notes that, in an ugly outbreak of vaccine wars, rich nations comprising just 16% of the world\u2019s population (including Australia) have cornered 60% of the global vaccine supply (4.2 billion doses) and low-income countries have secured only 270 million doses. Yet even on purely self-interested calculations, the equitable distribution of vaccines is essential: the rich world cannot be free of the threat of Covid-19 unless all countries have reached herd immunity by a combination of pre-existing immunities, infection and vaccination. Recreating a healthy rules-based international order that breaks down barriers to the free flow of masks, protective gear, test kits and pharmaceutical supplies would be a global public good.<\/p>\n

Last April, Prime Minister Narendra Modi exhorted India<\/a> to become \u2018the global nerve centre of \u2026 multinational supply chains in the post Covid-19 world\u2019. In his virtual address to the UN General Assembly on 26 September, Modi boasted that India\u2019s pharmaceutical industry had sent essential medicines to more than 150 countries and promised<\/a>: \u2018India\u2019s vaccine production and delivery capacity will be used to help all humanity in fighting this crisis.\u2019<\/p>\n

\u2018Sicken thy neighbour\u2019 policies led dozens of countries to impose restrictions, including outright bans in some cases, on exports of critical medical supplies like masks, medicines, ventilators and disinfectants. Espousing nationalist rhetoric and policies, while abandoning international cooperation, aggravated the crisis. Governments can better protect the people they claim to represent by reversing the equation\u2014ditching pandemic nationalism and embracing global cooperation instead.<\/p>\n

Finally, albeit somewhat unfortunately, there\u2019s also an element of schadenfreude in Indian circles that a developed Western country like Canada, whose do-gooder instinct often leads to irritating moralistic lectures on India\u2019s perceived human rights failings, should see its Prime Minister Justin Trudeau phoning Modi<\/a> on 10 February in a plea to boost vaccine supplies. Modi said India \u2018would do its best<\/a> to support Canada\u2019s vaccination efforts\u2019, but the request came too late to make the cut in India\u2019s initial allocation of vaccines, subject to export restrictions because of the massive domestic need, to 25 countries.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

On 23 February, India accounted for 11 million of the world\u2019s 112 million Covid-19 cases and 156,498 of 2,848,247 world deaths. 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