Bharat Biotech’s COVAXIN, India’s first indigenous vaccine against coronavirus. (Swarajya Magazine)To augment vaccine production, the Government has decided to support some public sector companies with grants under the Mission COVID Suraksha. One such company is the Hyderabad based Indian Immunological Limited (IIL), a facility established in 1982 by the National Dairy Development Board.
A technical collaboration agreement has been reached between IIL and Bharat Biotech, under which the IIL will supply the drug substance required for the manufacturing of Bharat Biotech’s Covaxin Vaccine.
The Managing Director of Indian Immunological Limited, Dr K Anand Kumar, said that the IIL plans to start producing drug substance for Covaxin from 15 June and send out the first batch to Bharat Biotech limited by July.
Stating that Indian Immunologicals expects to produce the drug substance for about 10-15 million doses per month, Dr Anand Kumar said it would be initially two to three million doses and scaled up to six to seven million per month later.
Dr Kumar shared that they are converting the Karkapatla manufacturing unit of IIL near Hyderabad into a Biosafety Level -3 (BSL3) facility to produce the drug substance and is also taking up construction of another block. The IIL is also working on another Covid-19 vaccine, and the animal trials are underway currently, and it expects to come out by next year for human vaccination.
Under Atma Nirbhar Bharat 3.0 Mission COVID Suraksha was announced by the Government of India to accelerate the development and production of indigenous COVID Vaccines. The Department of Biotechnology is implementing this mission.
The Indian Immunologicals Limited (IIL), Hyderabad, was sanctioned a grant of Rs 60 crore towards enhancing production capabilities.
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