Fresh Orders Placed To Procure Covid-19 Vaccines, To Be Delivered By July: Hardeep Singh Puri

As several states are witnessing shortage of vaccines due to sudden surge in Covid cases, the Centre has placed fresh orders to procure vaccines from two vaccine makers Serum Institute of India and Bharat Biotech. 

The Union aviation minister Hardeep Singh Puri on Tuesday said that the advance orders for May, June and July have been placed with the two manufacturers and payments have been made. 

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Taking to his official Twitter account, the minister said, “India’s fight against COVID-19 continues undaunted. Just a gentle reminder to those fuelling hesitancy & panic. More than 18 cr vaccine doses administered so far. Advance orders for May, June & July 2021 have been placed with the two manufacturers & payments have been made.” 

Elaborating the details of the order, Puri said the Government has placed advance orders to buy 5.6 crore vaccines from the Serum Institute, worth Rs 1,176 crore through PM Cares. He said the Health Ministry ordered over 11 crore doses on April 22 and 10 crore doses worth Rs 1,575 crore on May 10. 

Similarly, the government placed order with Bharat Biotech for 1 crore vaccines worth Rs 216.83 crore through PM Cares. “5cr doses worth Rs 866 cr on 22 April and 2 cr doses worth Rs 315 cr through MoHFW on 10 May 2021. Delivery of all these doses will be completed by July 2021,” he tweeted. 

So far, the total vaccine doses administered in the country are 17,52,35,991. Of these, 24,46,674 Vaccine doses were administered in single day on May 11.