Adar Poonawalla, Chief Executive Officer of Serum Institute of India (SII) said that SII stopped the production of the Covishield vaccine since December last year.
"Since December 2021, we have stopped the production of the Covishield vaccine. We had a stock of a few hundred million doses at that time and of that 100 million doses had already expired," Poonawalla told the reporters on the sidelines of the annual general meeting of the developing countries Vaccine Manufacturers Network on Thursday in Pune.
He further said that some vaccines are allowed to be mixed with others for booster doses, "Now Covovax should be allowed be mixed soon in two weeks, So I think they will and should probably have the policy to mix boosters," he stated.
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. Going forward, when people take a few shots every year, they may take anti-coronavirus vaccines and other shots together, Poonawalla said, adding, "It will become that kind of a product." "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.
"If WHO allowed it, then maybe the Indian regulator will and should allow it, but again boosters have no demand now. There is general lethargy among people. People are fed of COVID vaccines. To be honest, I am also fed up with it. We all are," he added.
*With inputs from agencies
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