Centre presents COVID vaccination roadmap to Supreme Court

The Centre has told the Supreme Court that it expects to get 188 crore vaccine doses by the end of this year, enough to cover the country’s entire adult population of 94 crore.

In an affidavit filed on Saturday, the Centre said the total population of the country aged 18 years and above is approximately 93-94 crore and administering two doses to these citizens would require an estimated 186 to 188 crore doses.

“Out of this requirement, 51.6 crore doses will be made available for administration by July 31, 2021, leaving a requirement of approximately 135 crore vaccine doses for complete vaccination to the eligible population,” it said.

Giving a break-up of vaccines till the date of filing of the affidavit i.e. 26 June,

The Centre said a total of 35.6 crore doses had been made available till June 26 – the date of filing the affidavit: 26.6 crore Covishield doses, 8 crore doses of Bharat Biotech’s Covaxin, and additional 1 crore doses as commodity assistance under the COVAX facility. It said that 31.5 lakh doses of the first component and 60,000 doses of the second component of Sputnik V had been received.

The affidavit also gave a breakdown of sources for 135 crore doses: Covishield (50 crore), Covaxin (40 crore), Bio E Subunit vaccine (30 crore), Zydus Cadila DNA vaccine (5 crore) and Sputnik V (10 crore).

In a May 31 order, the Supreme Court had criticised the government’s ‘liberalised’ vaccination policy, differential pricing of vaccines for Centre, states and private hospitals, basis of such a norm and mandatory registration on Co-WIN app in view of digital divide between rural and urban India. The court had asked the Centre to present a roadmap on how it plans to procure the remaining 135 crore doses.

The Supreme Court will examine the affidavit on June 30.