Serum Institute of India (SII) CEO Adar Poonawalla on Friday, 4 June, thanked US President Joe Biden and India’s External Affairs Minister Dr S Jaishankar for a “policy change” that would help in boosting India’s vaccine production capacity by increasing the supply of raw materials globally and to India.
Poonawalla said the policy change – as the US lifted restrictions from AstraZeneca and Novavax – will "strengthen our united fight against this pandemic".
Soon after, Jaishankar replied to Poonawalla’s tweet saying that Indian diplomacy is focussed on securing the vaccine supply chain.
Meanwhile, United States Vice President Kamala Harris on Thursday, 3 June, spoke to Prime Minister Narendra Modi about the US’ latest vaccine-sharing strategy and outlined a plan to make vaccines against COVID-19 available to other countries, including India, the PMO said in a statement.
Initial estimates indicated that India will receive 2-3 million vaccine doses in the first phase, as per a report by The Indian Express.
Announcing his COVID-19 vaccine sharing plan, Biden said that the US will share 80 million doses of their vaccine supply with the world. Further, he said that the first tranche will reportedly be of 25 million doses. The White House on Thursday was quoted by Bloomberg as stating that as part of this, the US plans to distribute seven million shots to Asia, including “hard-hit India”.
(With inputs from The Indian Express)
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