Manas Mishra
PUNE, India (Reuters) – The CEO of the world’s largest vaccine maker, Serum Institute of India, said the company has ramped up production ahead of the launch of vaccines against diseases such as malaria and dengue fever in the next few years by repurposing capacity used for production vaccines. COVID-19 vaccinations.
As COVID production declines as demand falls, the company is using that capacity to produce new shots, which it estimates will add two and a half billion doses to its overall output, CEO Adar Poonawalla said in an interview.
Serum produces AstraZeneca’s (NASDAQ:) COVID-19 vaccine under the brand name Covishield in India and also produces Novavax Protein COVID shots (NASDAQ:).
During the peak of the global health crisis, the company invested $2 billion to boost production.
The company currently sells about 1.5 billion doses of the vaccine each year, with a total production capacity estimated at 4 billion doses.
“And this is also important because if there is a pandemic again in the future, we will be able to vaccinate the whole of India within three to three to four months,” Poonawalla said.
The company is in talks with other countries and governments about using the facilities in future outbreaks, he said, but did not provide further details of the discussions.
Poonawalla said Serum has the capacity to produce 100 million doses of its malaria vaccine and could scale up further depending on demand. The company has already produced 25 million doses ahead of its launch in the coming months.
The ancient mosquito-borne disease still kills more than half a million people, mostly young children, in sub-Saharan Africa every year.
Poonawalla said Serum would focus on exporting its vaccines, such as the malaria shot, to other countries rather than signing technology transfer agreements.
Serum is also testing a single-dose vaccine against dengue fever, another painful and sometimes fatal mosquito-borne disease. This vaccine was developed based on research conducted by the US National Institutes of Health.
According to the CEO, this vaccine is in early to mid-stage trials in India and the company expects to complete late-stage trials in the next three years.
Japanese company Takeda Pharmaceutical also makes a dengue shot that is available in countries such as Indonesia and Thailand, as well as Argentina and Brazil, where there is currently a large outbreak and little vaccine available.
Other companies such as Indian Immunologicals are also developing vaccines against the disease.