States in India trying to buy own shots

At least 10 Indian states and half a dozen private corporations have announced their intention to import Covid-19 vaccines through a global tender process, but most have yet to receive responses as other countries mop up the majority of foreign-made vaccines.

The Indian government's liberalised strategy has left the vaccination of people aged 18 to 44 to individual states from May 1.

State governments have to buy the two approved domestic vaccines at prices fixed by the manufacturers or call for vaccine bids in an open market for imports. Any private player can also do the same.

Only three vaccines have so far been approved by the Indian drug regulator: Bharat Biotech's indigenous Covaxin; Serum Institute of India's AstraZeneca, which is also called Covishield; and Russia's Sputnik V.

On April 13, as vaccine shortages were reported across the country, the central government announced the fast tracking of emergency approvals for foreign-made vaccines that have been approved in the United States, Europe, Japan and the United Kingdom, or included in the World Health Organisation's emergency-use listing.

Foreign vaccines can thus be directly imported and used after a "bridging clinical trial" in India.

Hyderabad-based Reddy's Laboratories bought about 210,000 doses of Russia's Sputnik V shot in recent weeks, and it will be available to Indians at 995.40 rupees (S$18.12) per dose. India gave the vaccine emergency approval in mid-April.

Saying the doses allocated by the central government are not enough for their eligible populations, the governments of Uttar Pradesh, Tamil Nadu, Odisha, Karnataka, Andhra Pradesh and Uttarakhand states and the Mumbai city corporation have invited tenders from foreign vaccine makers.

India's biggest conglomerates, including the Tata group, Larsen & Toubro (L&T) and Reliance Industries, are reportedly exploring options to import vaccines directly from manufacturers to inoculate their employees.

An L&T spokesman told The Straits Times: "Our target is to get (vaccines) at the earliest - either through direct supply or through government centres."

Economists Ajay Shah and Amrita Agarwal wrote in the Indian Express that the liberalised strategy has increased the accessibility of multiple buyers to global vaccine supply. But lawyer Murali Neelakantan and economist Ashish Kulkarni argued that it was akin to each standalone McDonald's franchise trying to independently procure the raw ingredients required to make burgers and fries.

The ineffectiveness of decentralised procurement was worsened by vaccines being in short supply globally, said Mr Neelakantan. Most supplies have been snapped up by other countries, with some like Canada and the US ordering enough to vaccinate their population twice or thrice over.

"Every Indian state and municipal corporation can put out tenders but no vaccine maker has billions of doses in an overseas warehouse. Everybody who has been producing vaccines overseas has already sold them before they have produced them," said Mr Neelakantan.

The city corporation of Mumbai, India's wealthiest city and one of the first epicentres of the coronavirus in the country, called for expression of interest on May 12 to buy 10 million doses. But no manufacturer has responded within the deadline of a week.