PUNE: The CEO of the world’s biggest vaccine maker, Serum Institute of India, said the company has bolstered its manufacturing ahead of launches over the next few years of shots against diseases like malaria and dengue by repurposing facilities used to make COVID-19 immunisations.
With COVID-19 manufacturing scaled back as demand ebbs, the company is using those facilities to instead manufacture its newer shots, which it estimates will boost total production by two and a half billion doses, CEO Adar Poonawalla said in an interview.
Serum produces AstraZeneca’s COVID-19 vaccine under the brand name Covishield in India, and also makes Novavax’s protein-based shots.
It invested US$2 billion during the peak of the global health crisis to boost production.
The company currently sells about 1.5 billion total vaccine doses every year, and estimates a total production capacity of as much as 4 billion doses.
“And this is also important because if there is a pandemic again in the future, we can vaccinate the whole of India in a matter of three months, three to four months,” Poonawalla said.
The company is in talks with other countries and governments to utilise those facilities in the event of future outbreaks, he said, but did not provide further details on the discussions.
Poonawalla said Serum has capacity to manufacture 100 million doses of its malaria vaccine, and could scale up further depending on demand. It has already produced 25 million doses ahead of a launch in the coming months.
Source: CNA
