Covid-19: Five questions about vaccination

Facile comments about making the Covid-19 vaccine available to those who need it, rather than those who want it, hide the fact that India’s vaccine strategy needs an urgent reboot, one that requires honest answers to five questions

Facile comments about making the Covid-19 vaccine available to those who need it, rather than those who want it, hide the fact that India’s vaccine strategy needs an urgent reboot, one that requires honest answers to five questions. But first, it is important to accept one universal truth — everyone needs the vaccine, even though some may not want it.

Representational image. (Vipin Kumar /HT PHOTO)

Question one — is India staring at a vaccine supply crunch? The simple answer is yes, provided it doesn’t approve any more vaccines, and provided the makers of the two currently authorised vaccines do not increase their capacity, for which they have sought government funds. The crunch could mean that the country currently has access to just about 50-60% of the five million doses it hopes to administer every day.

Question two — why, if there was going to be an imminent supply crunch, did the government engage in vaccine diplomacy? Truth be told, only 10.5 million vaccines were given as grants, with 35 million being exported commercially and another 18 million exported under World Health Organization (WHO)’s COVAX facility, but that question will keep being raised till domestic vaccination gets a further boost.

Question three — why are other vaccines not being approved? As sound as the need for a bridging study is for vaccines approved in other geographies, it is hard to ignore the fact that India’s drug regulator had no problems approving Bharat Biotech’s Covaxin largely on faith (the data wasn’t available when it was approved). Approving some of the other vaccines, including Sputnik, could mean a boost in supply. Russia’s sovereign wealth fund has already struck deals with Indian manufacturers to make 700 million doses of the highly effective vaccine.

Question four — is an age-based criteria the best way to determine priority for vaccination? After all, the burden of Covid has been, and continues to be, disproportionate in urban areas, and everyone may gain if vaccination were opened up to all in hotspots.

And question five (which should have actually been the first question) — how serious is India’s political leadership about the Covid-safety protocol? They have participated in high-intensity poll campaigning (and will continue to do so in West Bengal, where five stages of polling remain), even though there has been little social distancing in their rallies and road shows.

Only when the government honestly addresses each of these questions responsibly will India be able to battle the second wave.