Production Of Covishield Stopped In Dec 2021, No Takers For Boosters: SII Chief Adar Poonawalla

New Delhi: Chief Executive Officer of Serum Institute of India (SII), Adar Poonawalla, on Thursday said the vaccine manufacturer stopped the production of the Covishield vaccine starting December 2021. He said that the total stock available at that time, around 100 million doses, had already got expired by December last year.

Poonawalla made these remarks while speaking to reporters on the sidelines of the annual general meeting of the Developing Countries Vaccine Manufacturers Network (DCVMN). The SII chief said booster vaccines have no demand as there is general lethargy among people and also because they are fed up with the pandemic, the news agency PTI reported.

“Since December 2021, we stopped the production (of Covishield). We had a stock of a few hundred million doses at that time and of that, 100 million doses have already expired,” said Poonawalla when asked about the update on the Covishield vaccine, the news agency reported.

He said that people are fed up with COVID and vaccines.

“Now, Covovax should be allowed in two weeks. So I think they will and should probably have the policy to mix boosters. If WHO allowed it, then maybe the Indian regulator will and should allow it. But again, boosters have no demand at the moment. There is lethargy generally. People are fed up of Covid, vaccines. To be honest, I am also fed up with it. We all are,” he said.

“In India, there is no culture of taking flu shots as we see it in the West. We tried when we launched a few vaccines in 2010. During the H1NI pandemic in 2011, no one took it. Flu is not something that sounds scary to people. They just do not want to take it,” he said.

Covishield was produced at the SII’s Pune facility with a master seed from Oxford University and AstraZeneca.

The SII had announced its partnership with Oxford University to manufacture the vaccine in April 2020.