As India begins vaccination campaign for adolescents from January 3, Covaxin maker Bharat Biotech has started re-labeling and exchanging stock lying with private hospitals, News18 has learned.
The company has started raising stock at its own expense for re-labeling or exchange after getting nod from the country’s top drug regulator to increase the expiry date from nine to 12 months.
The hospitals’ lobby, Association of Healthcare Providers India (AHPI), which represents 2,500 super specialty and 8,000 small hospitals across India, confirmed that Bharat Biotech has started picking up untapped stock.
“Out of the total stock of over 50,000 vaccines, about 70% of them – about 35,000 – are nearing expiration in March,” AHPI Director General Girdhar J Giani told News18. “The company has started taking stock from hospitals for re-labelling,” he said.
It had in November announced to extend the shelf life of Covaxin to 12 months from the earlier approval of nine months.
“In all, there are not more than one to two lakh stocks across the country that need to be re-labelled,” an industry source told News18.
Bharat Biotech is providing the pick-up facility of the vaccines and is bearing all the expenses in the process.
“The company is picking up the entire stock from the hospital, leaving it back with the expenditure on cold chain storage and distribution. Several crore rupees have been spent as the company is re-testing every vial before re-labelling,” the source said.
Bharat Biotech’s Covaxin is the only available option for adolescents in the 15-18 age group, while senior citizens and frontline workers will start receiving the precautionary dose from January 10.
Hospitals book new orders apart from the exchange
While some hospitals’ batches will be re-labelled, other hospitals will receive a new stock of Covaxin.
Karthik Rajagopal, Chief Operating Officer, Manipal Hospitals told News18, “We will get enough doses of Covaxin from Bharat Biotech to meet the demand for adolescent immunization as well as any booster doses for the priority group under senior citizens. to be fulfilled.”
“The company has informed us that they have selected us as one of the hospitals that will get all the fresh stock. So, from Monday, we are ready to start the campaign (vaccination) for adolescents,” Rajagopal said.
Other hospitals that received fresh stock include Cloudnine Group, Rainbow Hospital, Shishuka Hospital, Springleaf Hospital, Care & Cure and Motherhood Hospital.
Top hospitals including Fortis Healthcare, Medanta, Apollo Hospitals have already placed orders for fresh stock, apart from request for re-labeling or exchange of old stock.
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