Vaccine / International firm wants to supply 60M Sputnik V doses to Haryana: State govt

A company in Malta has expressed interest to supply up to 60 million doses of the Russian COVID-19 vaccine Sputnik V to Haryana directly, the state government has said. The interest has come from Malta's Pharma Regulatory Services Limited but it hasn't bid for a contract yet, Haryana said. It has offered to sell the vaccine at ₹1,120 per dose.

Vikrant Shekhawat : Jun 06, 2021, 07:42 AM

Chandigarh: The Haryana government on Saturday said it has received an “expression of interest” from a pharmaceutical company with its headquarters in Malta to provide up to 60 million doses of Sputnik V vaccine.

The move comes a day after the deadline for Haryana’s global tender for procuring 1 crore Covid-19 vaccine jabs for the state expired on Friday.

ACS (health) Rajeev Arora said “Although the offer has come after the due date of the tender, it is still being carefully examined to see if it meets the criteria of the tender document to ensure optimal vaccine availability for the state”.

“No bid was received during the tender period. An international pharmaceutical company with its headquarters in Malta — Pharma Regulatory Services Limited — however, now has given an expression of interest to Haryana Medical Services Corporation Limited to provide up to 60 million doses of Sputnik V vaccine manufactured by Gamaleya Institute and Russian Direct Investment Fund (RDIF)”, the state government said.

It added, “Sputnik V is one of the three vaccines currently approved by DCGI for use in India. As per the offer made by the firm, the per dose cost of the vaccine will be nearly Rs 1120. The firm has further given a timeline of 30 days to supply the first batch of 50,0000 doses, followed by 1 million doses every 20 days till supply is completed against a letter of credit issued in their name”.

“Many states have recently floated global tenders for Covid-19 vaccine procurement to augment the supplies being received from Government of India as well as to give a boost for vaccination of the 18-44 age group to provide complete immunisation to residents. In this regard, Haryana had also floated a global tender through Haryana Medical Services Corporation (HMSCL) on May 26 which closed on June 4”, the state government said.

Bharat Serum and Vaccines Limited, another pharmaceutical company, has applied in the tender for supplying 15,000 Amphotericin B injections to Haryana. These injections are being used to treat patients suffering from mucormycosis (black fungus). Health minister, Anil Vij, had said that the government was exploring modalities to award the tender of Amphotericin B injections to the single applicant who had applied in the tender.