The Narendra Modi government is likely to initiate a fresh round of talks with American pharma giant Johnson & Johnson to find a middle ground on domestic usage and export of its vaccines manufactured by Biological E in India, News18.com has learnt.
The move comes after Prime Minister Modi, during the Quad summit, promised to export 80 lakh doses of the same vaccine to the US by October.
According to a senior government official privy to the development, the Centre and the company have to explore a “middle ground”.
“The promised doses will be exported without any doubt. However, a strategy needs to be put in place where India may take a share of the monthly production of J&J’s vaccine for domestic use. For this, we need to resolve their demand for indemnity. All these talks will be initiated to find a middle ground,” the official said.
For now, the official said, the government is planning to ask for 50 per cent of the share from the total monthly production of the vaccine. “If the vaccine is being produced in India, we should be allowed to take 50 per cent share from its production for our own people. Once we will vaccinate our entire population, the company can start exporting more.”
Commenting on this, J&J spokesperson told News18.com, “As you know, we are in ongoing discussions with the Government of India to accelerate availability of the Johnson & Johnson Covid-19 vaccine. We will let you know when we have additional information to share.”
Indemnity demands of Pfizer, Moderna on backburner
India will make available 8 million doses of the Johnson and Johnson vaccine by the end of October, PM Modi had announced during the Quad Summit last weekend. The US pharma giant’s Covid-19 vaccine is being manufactured by India’s Hyderabad-based vaccine maker Biological E.
While India had to stop the export of vaccines due to high demand in the domestic market, PM Modi, under the Quad vaccine partnership, also announced the resumption of vaccine exports.
“We are not in a tight spot where we need foreign vaccines including Pfizer and Moderna. The discussions with them have been put on the back burner. However, J&J is being manufactured in India,” he had said.
J&J and Bio E have already sent 35 lakh doses of vaccine for quality testing to the Central Drugs Laboratory in Kasauli.
“We need to figure out if the company plans to export these batches or they have been tested for technical reasons,” the official said while adding that for domestic use the issue of indemnity — that J&J has been demanding — needs to be sorted first.
Read all the Latest News , Breaking News and IPL 2022 Live Updates here.
Comments
0 comment