Bangladesh pharma co pays advance to Serum Institute for COVID vaccine

Days after Dhaka said it is ready to collaborate with India in COVID-19 research, a pharmaceutical company from Bangladesh has announced that it has entered into a deal with Pune-based Serum Institute to ensure it gets a vaccine on a priority basis when one is developed successfully.

As per the deal, Beximco Pharmaceuticals will invest an amount in Serum Institute, which will be considered as an advance payment for delivery of the vaccine when manufacturing starts. The company will also be the sole distributor of the vaccine in Bangladesh.

The Indian company will “include Bangladesh among the countries who will be the first to receive an agreed quantity of this vaccine on a priority basis,” Beximco said in a statement.

The two companies have “the scale and capabilities to bring a hugely promising treatment to the people who need it the most” serum institute CEO Adar C Poonawalla and Shayan F Rahman, Principal, of Beximco said in a joint statement.

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The Serum institute has agreements with Pharma major AstraZeneca, which is developing a vaccine in association with Oxford University, and the Gates Foundation, among others to manufacture a vaccine developed successfully and make it available to global markets.

The vaccine being developed by AstraZeneca and Oxford is undergoing Phase III trials in India. The earlier trials of the vaccine candidate had shown encouraging results and may get approval in the UK towards the end of the year.

Serum Institute has said it has the capacity to produce more than a billion doses of the vaccine for global markets.

Bangladesh has reported about 3.1 lakh COVID cases and over 4,00  deaths.

The deal between Beximco and Serum institute comes about 10 days after foreign secretary Harsh Vardhan Shringla met Bangladesh prime minister Sheikh Hasina and his counterpart Masud Bin Momen and said that the neighbouring country would get priority in the supply of a vaccine developed in India. “India is in an advanced stage of COVID-19 trial, and it is going to produce vaccines at a massive level,” he had said during his August 19-20 visit.

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