Wuhan Coronavirus Resource Thread

[Kakkaji]

States start prioritising second shot for 45+, first jab slots being rescheduled

Most states have started to cancel and reschedule appointments for the first vaccination dose this week so as to prioritise those due for the second jab in 45-plus age group. This is in line with the Centre’s protocol that 70% of its vaccine supplies must be used for completing the second dose.

Andhra Pradesh, Delhi, Haryana, Punjab, Karnataka, West Bengal, Odisha, Telangana, Kerala and Madhya Pradesh are among the states

[sanjaykumar]

Very interesting, thanks. Role of the Lancet duly noted.

[sanjaykumar]

A lot is resting on this furin site as absent from SARS type coronaviruses. This is a nucleotide sequence that generates a peptide sequence recognised by proteinases that cleaves two domains of the spike protein which promotes membrane fusion and cellular uptake.

However it is found in several coronaviruses generally. A recombination event may have generated it along with many other sequences. It may be that it is like Jung’s synchronicity. It’s profound only because it means something to humans.


It is claimed that the domain binding protein from the pangolin virus (ratsg13?) has a tighter binding affinity for human ACE II.

I would like to see the binding constants. Anyhow the implication is Wuhan virology lab to pangolins. Rather than bats to pangolins to humans.

[Suraj]

Suraj - Zy-Cov-D will not solve any problem because they have almost no production capacity due to lack of financing. Zydus can produce 200 million vaccines a year and it is a 3 dose vaccine. So, basically a drop in the bucket. This situation will only improve once Biological-e's vaccine + covaxin and covishield production increases.

Please provide further reference information to substantiate this. Not attacking you - I'd like to know so I can forward this information and see what can be done to make things better.

[Pratyush]

Suraj - Zy-Cov-D will not solve any problem because they have almost no production capacity due to lack of financing. Zydus can produce 200 million vaccines a year and it is a 3 dose vaccine. So, basically a drop in the bucket. This situation will only improve once Biological-e's vaccine + covaxin and covishield production increases.

Please provide further reference information to substantiate this. Not attacking you - I'd like to know so I can forward this information and see what can be done to make things better.

1) If the vaccine is proven to be useful then the production capacity can always be supplemented. It is important to figure out how useful it will be.

2) The issue IMO is not just the production capacity of the vaccine covidshield and covaxine. It is also the ability to transport them to all parts of the county and administer to public in a safe manner due to the special logistical requirements of the drug.

[sooraj]

Cipla enters into licensing pact with Eli Lilly for Baricitinib drug

[pgbhat]

Suraj - Zy-Cov-D will not solve any problem because they have almost no production capacity due to lack of financing. Zydus can produce 200 million vaccines a year and it is a 3 dose vaccine. So, basically a drop in the bucket. This situation will only improve once Biological-e's vaccine + covaxin and covishield production increases.

Please provide further reference information to substantiate this. Not attacking you - I'd like to know so I can forward this information and see what can be done to make things better.

https://www.business-standard.com/artic ... 011_1.html

Ahmedabad-based drug major Cadila Healthcare is testing if a two-dose regimen of its DNA-plasmid vaccine ZyCoV-D works instead of a three-dose one, showing similar levels of efficacy. The company is conducting phase 3 efficacy trials on a three-dose regimen of its DNA plasmid technology-based Covid-19 vaccine, which is in its last leg.

[Suraj]

I'm aware that Zycov-D is a 3-dose regiment. That is not new information. I'm more interested in their funding or manufacturing related information.

[Pratyush]

Zydus Cadila Healthcare starts producing Covid-19 vaccine

Article dated Apr 23, 2021

The article talks about an inhouse annual capacity of 120 million doses. With additional capacity being provided by outside vendors. The plan is to produce 240 Million doses over the next 12 months. They think that authorization to use the drug will be received either this month of the next.

[nandakumar]

I'm aware that Zycov-D is a 3-dose regiment. That is not new information. I'm more interested in their funding or manufacturing related information.

The key operating company (Zydus Group) is called Cadila Healthcare Limited. They are an extremely profitable company. Their networth is in excess Rs 10,000 crore against a debt of little over Rs 1500 crore. If they have a credible vaccine they have the money. These figures are from memory. I can put down all the numbers from their financial statements if required.

[Suraj]

Good information. Both Covishield and Covaxin were produced in significant volume before their EUAs came, something that was very helpful because it enabled a stockpile that helped us vaccinate far more than actual production both in March and April.

[Zynda]

This report highlights that for BB to scale up production, they are dependent on certain input items/materials from EU, which is proving to be an issue.

Tech transfers, supply of materials must to scale up vaccine production: Bharat Biotech joint MD
Excerpts...

"India is a large country, we cannot vaccinate 2.6 billion (twin dosages for 1.3 billion people) of our population, that needs it in this point in time," Bharat Biotech Joint MD Suchitra Ella said.

Speaking at the EU-India Business Roundtable, Ella noted that more than patent relaxations, it is the partnerships and continuous supplies of critical materials which are critical to ramp up the production and cater not only to domestic demand but also to countries across the globe.

While acknowledging the importance of knowledge sharing and partnerships with the European Union (EU), she also pointed out blockages in supply of certain critical equipment and materials necessary for Covaxin production from the region.

“There are process equipment which are backlogged in Europe right now. It is not a complaint, I am just saying that the amount of quantities we are ordering is probably throwing the supplies off.

“These are unprecedented numbers. So, I think it is important to share knowledge, technology and to respect each other’s area or interest,” Ella said.

She noted that the vaccine manufacturers in the country needed the raw materials in enormous quantities so that the production of the COVID-19 vaccine could be enhanced.

“I want to reiterate that patents are important but I don’t see them as a huge challenge right now.

“What we need is technology transfers and certain materials for vaccine production which come for Europe,” Ella said when asked if relaxations in patents would help vaccine manufacturers.

Bharat Biotech is in the process of ramping up manufacturing capacity of Covaxin to 70 crore dosages per annum.

Not sure if we can indigenize each and every input...probably impractical.

[Tanaji]

https://nicholaswade.medium.com/origin- ... f03564c038
Please read in full. Also note the role of the Lancet.

Thanks for posting this. It is a must read for anyone tracking this thread closely.

[sohamn]

I'm aware that Zycov-D is a 3-dose regiment. That is not new information. I'm more interested in their funding or manufacturing related information.

Right now Cadila has internal capacity to produce 1 Cr vaccine a month, they are working to see if that can be optimized to produce 1.4 Cr a month in-house, furthermore they are discussing with some contract manufacturers to explore another 1 Cr dose a month. By the end of the year they will attempt to produce 2.4 Cr a month. For a 3 Shot vaccine these numbers will make no difference.

The real change will happen by end of August when Bio-e and Baylors vaccine will come in play as they can churn around 7Cr a month and at the same time Serum will exceed 10 Cr a month and BB crossing 5 Cr a month. This will be further augumented by smaller numbers from Sputnik, Cadila and J&J.

[nandakumar]

I'm aware that Zycov-D is a 3-dose regiment. That is not new information. I'm more interested in their funding or manufacturing related information.

Right now Cadila has internal capacity to produce 1 Cr vaccine a month, they are working to see if that can be optimized to produce 1.4 Cr a month in-house, furthermore they are discussing with some contract manufacturers to explore another 1 Cr dose a month. By the end of the year they will attempt to produce 2.4 Cr a month. For a 3 Shot vaccine these numbers will make no difference.

The real change will happen by end of August when Bio-e and Baylors vaccine will come in play as they can churn around 7Cr a month and at the same time Serum will exceed 10 Cr a month and BB crossing 5 Cr a month. This will be further augumented by smaller numbers from Sputnik, Cadila and J&J.

Even if they put in place in-house manufacturing capacity of 14 million per month output that translates into roughly 8 million citizens per month vaccination capacity (in equivalent doses of a 2 shot vaccination). That is nearly 160% of what Covaxin capacity which can vaccinate 5 million persons per month (10 million by 2). Not insubstantial.

[Primus]

https://nicholaswade.medium.com/origin- ... f03564c038
Please read in full. Also note the role of the Lancet.

Thanks Srutayus Ji. I have read the article in detail, quite sobering. There is a four hour long podcast on the role of SynBio attacks - deliberate or accidental by Rob Reid and Sam Harris which is quite fascinating.

I think this article is so important that I have taken the liberty of summarizing it for BRF readers, details and links are all in the original. Mods may wish to move or delete it if not in the spirit of the thread. I believe it is a fresh review and much needed, esp when you consider the role of the US government and the much adored Dr. Fauci.

______________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

A week ago an article was published by Nicholas Wade, a science writer from the NYT who has worked on Nature and Science journals in the past. He argues that the origins of the virus causing havoc in the world for over a year are still shrouded in mystery. This is because right from the beginning every effort was made by China and its sponsored scientists around the world to suppress any thought that this may have been made in a lab, the alternate hypothesis that it is naturally occurring and somehow jumped from bats to humans through the ‘wet markets’ of Wuhan is far more palatable and acceptable.

Wade puts forward a painstaking argument from both sides and lets the reader conclude what they will, although the evidence he puts forward strongly argues for a lab origin. It is a very, very long article but makes a fascinating read. I highly recommend it.

For TLDR types, I will summarize it here (spoiler alert). The entire story reads like a Robert Ludlum novel complete with twists and turns, heroes and villains and collusion at the highest levels of American and Chinese bureaucracy.

It appears that the Ecohealth alliance, an American non-profit organization headed by Dr. Peter Daszak was given a grant by the NIH to the tune of millions of dollars to fund research in the Wuhan lab conducted by Shi Zheng-Li (the ‘Bat Lady’). She had set out to create novel coronaviruses with the highest possible infectivity for human cells. The lab she worked in was a BSL2 and not BSL4 capable which should be the case.

On 9 December 2019, before the outbreak of the pandemic became generally known, Dr. Daszak gave an interview in which he talked in glowing terms of how researchers at the Wuhan Institute of Virology had been reprogramming the spike protein and generating chimeric coronaviruses capable of infecting humanized mice.

The NIH had funded this research from 2014 to 2019. It incredible that the American government would sponsor research in a lab in China to create something so monstrous. And yet it happened. Peter Daszak was the contractor for the grant and he subcontracted it to Shi. They all knew that this woman was working on ‘gain in function’ methodology to make the virus even more deadly and to be able to infect humans. There was actually a moratorium on this kind of research under the US law but there was a footnote clause (an escape clause) that allowed it ‘in national interest’. This required the head of the NIAD, Anthony Fauci and his counterpart in the NIH, Francis Collins to sign off on it. Which they did, as per Wade, but have not acknowledged it publicly.

And so it was.

In February 2020, just one week after the WHO so reluctantly announced that indeed the world was facing a new pandemic originating in China, a letter was published in the Lancet refuting all possibility of a lab origin for the virus identified in the pandemic. This letter was signed by 27 prominent virologists and stated categorically that it was a naturally occurring virus, even though they presented no evidence to support this, simply asserting their authority on the world, expecting everyone to believe them because they were the ‘experts in the field’.

It later turned out that the Lancet letter had been organized and drafted by Peter Daszak himself, president of the EcoHealth Alliance of New York. If the SARS2 virus had indeed escaped from research he funded, Dr. Daszak would be potentially culpable. This acute conflict of interest was not declared to the Lancet’s readers. To the contrary, the letter concluded, “We declare no competing interests.”

A month later, another group of ‘eminent’ virologists published another opinion piece in Nature, supporting the ‘naturally occurring virus’ theory. Again, no evidence was offered, just conjecture and hypotheses that have subsequently been debunked by other experts.

The National Institutes of Health was supporting gain-of-function research, of a kind that could have generated the SARS2 virus, in an unsupervised foreign lab that was doing work in BSL2 biosafety conditions. The prudence of this decision can be questioned, whether or not SARS2 and the death of 3 million people was the result of it.

Because President Trump said the virus had escaped from a Wuhan lab, editors gave the idea little credence. They joined the virologists in regarding lab escape as a dismissible conspiracy theory. During the Trump Administration, they had no trouble in rejecting the position of the intelligence services that lab escape could not be ruled out. But when Avril Haines, President Biden’s director of National Intelligence, said the same thing, she too was largely ignored.

Wade argues that this happens because the mainstream media in the US (and possibly the world) has shifted to the left of the political spectrum.

In conclusion, he puts the blame squarely on the following four agencies:

1. Chinese virologists who have been performing gain of function studies in highly dangerous viruses in an attempt to make them even more lethal to humans
2. Chinese authorities, who may not have created the virus but did their utmost to suppress and conceal the nature of the tragedy and their ultimate responsibility for it.
3. International Virologists who found the lure of creating even more dangerous viruses and playing with possibilities too tempting and lobbied the US government to fund such research and lift any moratoriums on limits placed on it.
4. The US role in funding the Wuhan laboratory when it knew that it was only a BSL2 lab and was pursuing gain of function studies on such dangerous viruses.

[vijayk]

https://nicholaswade.medium.com/origin- ... f03564c038
Please read in full. Also note the role of the Lancet.

Thanks Srutayus Ji. I have read the article in detail, quite sobering. There is a four hour long podcast on the role of SynBio attacks - deliberate or accidental by Rob Reid and Sam Harris which is quite fascinating.

I think this article is so important that I have taken the liberty of summarizing it for BRF readers, details and links are all in the original. Mods may wish to move or delete it if not in the spirit of the thread. I believe it is a fresh review and much needed, esp when you consider the role of the US government and the much adored Dr. Fauci.

______________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

A week ago an article was published by Nicholas Wade, a science writer from the NYT who has worked on Nature and Science journals in the past. He argues that the origins of the virus causing havoc in the world for over a year are still shrouded in mystery. This is because right from the beginning every effort was made by China and its sponsored scientists around the world to suppress any thought that this may have been made in a lab, the alternate hypothesis that it is naturally occurring and somehow jumped from bats to humans through the ‘wet markets’ of Wuhan is far more palatable and acceptable.

Wade puts forward a painstaking argument from both sides and lets the reader conclude what they will, although the evidence he puts forward strongly argues for a lab origin. It is a very, very long article but makes a fascinating read. I highly recommend it.

For TLDR types, I will summarize it here (spoiler alert). The entire story reads like a Robert Ludlum novel complete with twists and turns, heroes and villains and collusion at the highest levels of American and Chinese bureaucracy.

It appears that the Ecohealth alliance, an American non-profit organization headed by Dr. Peter Daszak was given a grant by the NIH to the tune of millions of dollars to fund research in the Wuhan lab conducted by Shi Zheng-Li (the ‘Bat Lady’). She had set out to create novel coronaviruses with the highest possible infectivity for human cells. The lab she worked in was a BSL2 and not BSL4 capable which should be the case.

On 9 December 2019, before the outbreak of the pandemic became generally known, Dr. Daszak gave an interview in which he talked in glowing terms of how researchers at the Wuhan Institute of Virology had been reprogramming the spike protein and generating chimeric coronaviruses capable of infecting humanized mice.

The NIH had funded this research from 2014 to 2019. It incredible that the American government would sponsor research in a lab in China to create something so monstrous. And yet it happened. Peter Daszak was the contractor for the grant and he subcontracted it to Shi. They all knew that this woman was working on ‘gain in function’ methodology to make the virus even more deadly and to be able to infect humans. There was actually a moratorium on this kind of research under the US law but there was a footnote clause (an escape clause) that allowed it ‘in national interest’. This required the head of the NIAD, Anthony Fauci and his counterpart in the NIH, Francis Collins to sign off on it. Which they did, as per Wade, but have not acknowledged it publicly.

And so it was.

In February 2020, just one week after the WHO so reluctantly announced that indeed the world was facing a new pandemic originating in China, a letter was published in the Lancet refuting all possibility of a lab origin for the virus identified in the pandemic. This letter was signed by 27 prominent virologists and stated categorically that it was a naturally occurring virus, even though they presented no evidence to support this, simply asserting their authority on the world, expecting everyone to believe them because they were the ‘experts in the field’.

It later turned out that the Lancet letter had been organized and drafted by Peter Daszak himself, president of the EcoHealth Alliance of New York. If the SARS2 virus had indeed escaped from research he funded, Dr. Daszak would be potentially culpable. This acute conflict of interest was not declared to the Lancet’s readers. To the contrary, the letter concluded, “We declare no competing interests.”

A month later, another group of ‘eminent’ virologists published another opinion piece in Nature, supporting the ‘naturally occurring virus’ theory. Again, no evidence was offered, just conjecture and hypotheses that have subsequently been debunked by other experts.

The National Institutes of Health was supporting gain-of-function research, of a kind that could have generated the SARS2 virus, in an unsupervised foreign lab that was doing work in BSL2 biosafety conditions. The prudence of this decision can be questioned, whether or not SARS2 and the death of 3 million people was the result of it.

Because President Trump said the virus had escaped from a Wuhan lab, editors gave the idea little credence. They joined the virologists in regarding lab escape as a dismissible conspiracy theory. During the Trump Administration, they had no trouble in rejecting the position of the intelligence services that lab escape could not be ruled out. But when Avril Haines, President Biden’s director of National Intelligence, said the same thing, she too was largely ignored.

Wade argues that this happens because the mainstream media in the US (and possibly the world) has shifted to the left of the political spectrum.

In conclusion, he puts the blame squarely on the following four agencies:

1. Chinese virologists who have been performing gain of function studies in highly dangerous viruses in an attempt to make them even more lethal to humans
2. Chinese authorities, who may not have created the virus but did their utmost to suppress and conceal the nature of the tragedy and their ultimate responsibility for it.
3. International Virologists who found the lure of creating even more dangerous viruses and playing with possibilities too tempting and lobbied the US government to fund such research and lift any moratoriums on limits placed on it.
4. The US role in funding the Wuhan laboratory when it knew that it was only a BSL2 lab and was pursuing gain of function studies on such dangerous viruses.

Great Summary

[Srutayus]

Ironically, Dr. Fauci and the Lancet, and the NYT as a less central player, who have been good at pontificating to the world about the pandemic seem to have had a central role in creating it and covering up later. Chinese authorities and US institutions seem to be deeply complicit adding to the pressure to brush this under the carpet, literally at the cost of millions of lives and even more in the future as this type of GOF research continues unchecked without a reckoning.
The truth will eventually come out, as the Francis Bacon quote at the end of the article says: "Truth is the daughter not of authority but of time." And it will, unfortunately, have a severe deleterious effect on the credibility of scientists, and more unfortunately, science.

[Tanaji]

The state of discourse on this topic has already been heavily politicised. If you got a moment say that the virus may have escaped, you are labelled as either a right wing Trumper or a conspiracy theorist. Facts or reason are no longer points for discussion any more.

The tactic is to lie big and apologises small, similar to what tabloids do. Eventually the truth may come out, and it will be filed away in an obscure journal somewhere. Meanwhile the damage has already been done and the narrative fixed.

[Kakkaji]

Behind paywall, but I can see the entire story on my mobile:

Russia's Sputnik V jabs set to make India debut at private hospitals

The journey of Russia’s Sputnik V vaccine in India is likely to begin from private hospitals across several cities this month as a large consignment is expected by the third week.

According to private hospitals, Dr Reddy’s Laboratories (DRL) is in advanced stages of discussions with many of them and is drawing up a list of hospitals that would receive the first doses of Sputnik V for administering to citizens. Discussions with the Centre, too, are on for the Sputnik V procurement, which is expected to get a fillip as Indian manufacturing sites start production around

The story further says that Sputnik V requires to be stored at -12 to -18 degrees Celsius. Dr Reddy's has designed a box that will keep the vaccine at that temparature. A customer can buy this box for Rs 15,000, and Dr Reddy's will fill the box with a week's supply of vaccine doses for that customer. Next week, Dr Reddy's people will come to your facility again to fill the empty box. They have been testing out that logistics model all the way to Manipur.

It is good that another large pharma company like Dr Reddy's will join the SII IN india's vaccination drive soon. Cadilla is another large, financially strong pharma company that can scale up and support its vaccine in the field.

With regards to 2.4 crore doses of ZyCad vaccine being 'minuscule', that is 80 lakh people vaccinated a month - which is equal to a good-sized city like Jaipur or Hyderabad. India needs every dose it can get. If the storage requirements of the ZyCad vaccine are not too stringent, then perhaps it can be sent to some remote districts, and the entire districts can be vaccinated with it. The possibilities are endless.

If, as projected, by the end of this year India is producing more vaccines than it needs internally, then at that time I would say use the indigenous ones like Covaxin and ZyCad in India, and leave the excess Covishield and Sputnik V for export, to earn some dollars.

[vijayk]

few of the common reference who were extremely serious Corona patients tried this methylene blue treatment along with regular ongoing treatment. It worked really well & have recovered pretty well. Also there are many such references in Surat, Bhavnagar & Mumbai wherein docs have been using methylene blue to treat Corona & getting successful results.

https://methylene-blue.conzapp.com/meth ... rophylaxis
https://bmcinfectdis.biomedcentral.com/ ... 21-05993-0

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC7409924/

[Kakkaji]

Amid spike in demand, won't be able to send oxygen to other states: Kerala

Kerala Chief Minister Pinarayi Vijayan on Monday told Prime Minister Narendra Modi that with the Covid case load surging, his state will no longer be able to supply oxygen to Tamil Nadu and Karnataka, as was being done till now.

[Anujan]

Russia was ready for epidemics. They had bioweapons and maintained research labs with capabilities of making vaccine as a matter of fact. This is how it must be done. First jabs of Sputnik were made available in OCT'2020. West ignore it, India ignored as well.

Communists were obsessed about science and healthcare. Russia always had a strong vaccine program, and were proud of it from cold war days. It was mostly a public health venture and not some bioweapons research effort.

The vaccination program started from diseases that the troops caught in world war 1. It had been massively funded till then. The funding dried up when Soviet Union broke up (some of their scientists wanted to emigrate to India, but India did not spread the red carpet for them). The funding picked up in the 2000's

You might be surprised to know that mass polio vaccination started in Russia, before the US (even though most people know about Salk and US polio vaccination). This was because of frequent outbreaks in the soviet republics. They had vaccinated all their children much before US vaccination for polio started picking up steam. The Husband-wife duo of Mikhail Chumakov and Marina Voroshilova tried it on their own children first.

[Kakkaji]

Oh that dirty word again: 'Profit'

After just Rs 18,000 cr profits in a decade, Serum, Bharat Biotech may earn big with Covid

For both companies, the pandemic presents a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to earn hundreds of crores of rupees that could be ploughed back to fund further research and capacity expansion

Even as questions are being raised about vaccine pricing ethics in the face of a devastating coronavirus pandemic, the next few years could see Serum Institute of India (SII) and Bharat Biotech minting hundreds of crores of rupees. Both companies have earned Rs 18,000 crore in profits in the past decade, a fraction of what global pharmaceutical and vaccine companies earns annually.

Of the Rs 18,000 crore in profits, Pune-based SII, one of the world’s biggest vaccine makers, alone earned Rs 17,146 crore between 2010-11 and 2019-20; Bharat Biotech accounted for the rest.

[Sicanta]

Ward-level war rooms, dashboard for beds, consistent oxygen supply — Mumbai’s civic body put in place a slew of systems to bring down the Covid curve. Chahal, a 1989-batch IAS officer, has been at the centre of that process since he took charge as BMC Commissioner in May last year.

https://indianexpress.com/article/india ... 8663/?s=08

Lots of data points on handling the covid emergency, preparing for possible 3rd wave and centre-state coordination

[Kakkaji]

UK lowers COVID-19 alert level from ‘rising exponentially' to ‘general circulation'

UK health chiefs on Monday agreed to lower the country's COVID-19 alert level from four to three, which indicates that coronavirus transmissions are no longer “rising exponentially” but are instead in “general circulation”.

The five-level alert system was devised last year to determine the levels of lockdown and social distancing required to keep the rate of infections from the deadly virus under check.

[Kakkaji]

Regular ivermectin use may cut risk of contracting COVID-19, claims study

Regular use of the oral antiparasitic drug ivermectin may significantly reduce the risk of contracting COVID-19, according to a review of available data by researchers who claim the medicine can help end the pandemic. The research, published in the May-June issue of the American Journal of Therapeutics, is the most comprehensive review of the available data on ivermectin taken from clinical, in vitro, animal, and real-world studies, its authors said.

"We applied the gold standard to qualify the data reviewed before concluding that ivermectin can end this pandemic," Kory said in a statement.

Ivermectin is an oral drug is used as a prescription medication to treat parasitic infections.

[Kakkaji]

Bharat Biotech commences direct supply of 'Covaxin' to 14 states

Bharat Biotech has commenced direct supply of its COVID-19 vaccine 'Covaxin' to 14 states, including Delhi and Maharashtra, with effect from May 1, according to the company's Joint Managing Director Suchitra Ella. The Hyderabad-based firm has started supplying its COVID-19 treatment vaccine to the states based on the allocations received by the central government.

"Bharat Biotech confirms direct supplies of COVAXIN to the following state govt's since 1/5/21, based on the allocations received by GoI. Requests have been received from other states, & will be processed for distribution based on availability of stocks 24x7," Ella tweeted.

The company is supplying vaccines to Andhra Pradesh, Assam, Chhattisgarh, Gujarat, Jammu & Kashmir, Jharkhand, Madhya Pradesh, Odisha, Tamil Nadu, Telangana, Uttar Pradesh and West Bengal.

On April 29, Bharat Biotech announced a cut in the price of 'Covaxin' for states to Rs 400 per dose from the earlier Rs 600 per dose.

[chetak]

the lootyens presstitutes and the national media are very quiet about it, meaning that this guy is well connected to the eyetalian mafia

among many other restaurants, he owns khan chacha in khan market

Let this sink in

Navneet Kalra procured 7500 Oxygen Concentrators at average of ₹ 17,000 and sold it for ₹ 70,000 each.

via@Sootradhar·9 May

[Suraj]

Right now Cadila has internal capacity to produce 1 Cr vaccine a month, they are working to see if that can be optimized to produce 1.4 Cr a month in-house, furthermore they are discussing with some contract manufacturers to explore another 1 Cr dose a month. By the end of the year they will attempt to produce 2.4 Cr a month. For a 3 Shot vaccine these numbers will make no difference.

The real change will happen by end of August when Bio-e and Baylors vaccine will come in play as they can churn around 7Cr a month and at the same time Serum will exceed 10 Cr a month and BB crossing 5 Cr a month. This will be further augumented by smaller numbers from Sputnik, Cadila and J&J.

Even if they put in place in-house manufacturing capacity of 14 million per month output that translates into roughly 8 million citizens per month vaccination capacity (in equivalent doses of a 2 shot vaccination). That is nearly 160% of what Covaxin capacity which can vaccinate 5 million persons per month (10 million by 2). Not insubstantial.

Covaxin production has ramped up significantly. It was 5m/month through Feb. Increased to 15m/month in March, 20m in April and 30m estimated this month. Bharat Biotech have multiple Hyderabad facilities. now, a Bangalore facility, and additional lines at Indian Immunologicals (IIL) and Bharat Immunologicals and Biologicals Corporation (BIBCOL) coming online July.


link to story

Best as I undertand, Bharat Biotech claims their own production will be 60-70m doses a month in July/August. IIL and BIBCOL each add another 15-20m doses a month.

Biological E are interesting but too far out to tell. They only just got Phase 3 clearance a couple of weeks ago. Zycov-D on the other hand are close to wrapping up their Phase 3 and ready to seek EUA pending acceptance of interim results by ICMR. The nice thing about Biological-E appears to be their ability and willingness to stockpile production ahead of any approval so it can be distributed the moment approval comes. That's what Covishield and Covaxin did.

[Kakkaji]

The nice thing about Biological-E appears to be their ability and willingness to stockpile production ahead of any approval so it can be distributed the moment approval comes. That's what Covishield and Covaxin did.

Also, if it is actually the J&J single-shot vaccine that Biological-E will produce, that will logistically be a game-changer in being able to take the vaccine to communities, and vaccinating an entire locality in one day.

[Suraj]

Biological-E's negotiations with J&J for contract manufacture are separate from the vaccine candidate they are developing independently in collaboration with Baylor University.

The ICMR Covid-19 Vaccines page lists good details on the status of each candidate along with links to their regulatory documents. The Biological-E candidate is not yet in Ph3, while Zycov-D registered their Ph3 back in early April.

If you look at the registry information of both, it's clear that Zycov-D has a better chance of near-term readiness even if production volumes aren't as high as Biological-E's claims.

[Amber G.]

This may be of interest to some:

India Science' question hour covid-19 phone-in let's talk vaccine: with Prof ( Dr ) Ashok Seth , Padma Bhushan, - Today 10th May 2021 at 3.P.M to 3.30 P.M. One can send queries live on India Science today

I think the youtube version (will check later to see if it is okay) https://youtu.be/br-vGlcwSJI

[chetak]

The manufacturing facility owned by Intervet India Pvt Ltd was in the process of shutting down for commercial reasons when Bharat Biotech came forward to use the facility with permission from Intervet.


Bombay High Court allows Bharat Biotech to use a plant in Poona to scale up Covaxin production, directs Maharashtra to grant requisite approvals

10 May, 2021 ,

The Bombay High Court on Thursday permitted Biovet Pvt. Ltd., an associate company of Bharat Biotech to take possession of the 'ready to use' manufacturing plant in Pune, Maharashtra to operate and manufacture COVID-19 vaccine, 'Covaxin'

The manufacturing facility owned by Intervet India Pvt Ltd was in the process of shutting down for commercial reasons when Bharat Biotech came forward to use the facility with permission from Intervet.


The Court further directed the Chief Conservator of Forests of Pune Division, Pune District Collector and Forest Department of Maharashtra to grant appropriate licenses and permissions required by Biovet in a time bound manner to enable manufacture of the vaccine.

These interim directions were passed by Bench of Justices KK Tated and NR Borkar on a petition filed by Biovet seeking to quash and set aside the order of the Deputy Conservatory of Forests refusing to grant it permission run the vaccination manufacturing unit.

The ready-to-use BLS-3 vaccine manufacturing facility was owned by Intervet India Pvt Ltd. They were in the process of shutting down the plant as they were closing their business for commercial reasons.

In its interim application seeking urgent possession of the manufacturing plant, Biovet made the following arguments:

That there were only three manufacturers in the country capable of producing COVID vaccine and Biovet being an associate of Bharat Biotech was one of them;

That there is shortage of this vaccine and the present manufacturing plant of Biovet is unable to meed the demands;

That Intervet was still using the manufacturing unit and had agreed to hand over the plant to Biovet to enhance its vaccine production.

Advocate General Ashutosh Kumbhakoni appearing for the State submitted that while they had no objecting to Biotech using the plant for production of Covaxin, they did not want Biovet to claim equity on the basis of this permission during the final hearing of the petition.

Biovet filed an affidavit-cum-undertaking to this effect stating that they will use the unit for manufacturing Covaxin used for COVID-19 and not claim equity of the permission granted now during the final hearing of the plea.

Kumbhakoni also stated that the State departments will co-operate for grant of any permission, if required to start manufacturing activities.

"The application filed by Biovet will be decided without wasting time, considering the present COVID-19 position in Maharashtra," he submitted.

The Court, therefore, proceeded to allow the application considering the fact that applicants are ready and willing to start manufacturing activity and the State was not objecting to the application.

Advocates Prathamesh Kamat, Zoeb Cuterwala and Vikram Kamath instructed by Phoenix Legal appeared for Intervet.

Advocates RD Soni and Sujay Gawde instructed by Shree and Co. appeared for Biovet.

Advocate General was assisted by Advocate Akshay Shinde and Government Pleader PP Kakade.

[Kakkaji]

India fastest country globally to administer 17 crore COVID-19 vaccine doses

India is the fastest country globally to administer 17 crore COVID-19 vaccine doses, the Union Health Ministry said on Monday. China took 119 days while the US took 115 days for reaching the same landmark. The vaccination drive in India was rolled out on January 16 with healthcare workers getting inoculated and vaccination of frontline workers started from February 2. Subsequently, it was opened for different age groups.

[Suraj]

The manufacturing facility owned by Intervet India Pvt Ltd was in the process of shutting down for commercial reasons when Bharat Biotech came forward to use the facility with permission from Intervet.


Bombay High Court allows Bharat Biotech to use a plant in Poona to scale up Covaxin production, directs Maharashtra to grant requisite approvals

This is a great piece of news. I knew that Bharat Biotech and Panacea Biotec were the only two private players with BSL-3 facilities. It appears this Intervet also had one, and Bharat Biotech swiftly moved in to take over the facility. I hope GoI and GoMH invest funds into enabling this facility to be ramped up quickly.

Covaxin seems to have a well set path to ~70m doses/month from BB plus 30-40m from IIL+BIBCOL by August. Any further capacity would be great.

[chetak]

The manufacturing facility owned by Intervet India Pvt Ltd was in the process of shutting down for commercial reasons when Bharat Biotech came forward to use the facility with permission from Intervet.


Bombay High Court allows Bharat Biotech to use a plant in Poona to scale up Covaxin production, directs Maharashtra to grant requisite approvals

This is a great piece of news. I knew that Bharat Biotech and Panacea Biotec were the only two private players with BSL-3 facilities. It appears this Intervet also had one, and Bharat Biotech swiftly moved in to take over the facility. I hope GoI and GoMH invest funds into enabling this facility to be ramped up quickly.

Covaxin seems to have a well set path to ~70m doses/month from BB plus 30-40m from IIL+BIBCOL by August. Any further capacity would be great.

just saying onlee: I have faith in Modi and he will find the solution.

Bharat Biotech has gone the unstoppable route via the courts.

MVA recalcitrance is of little concern now

and all there are new facilities without advance orders booked and delivery concerns.

Their entire output can be utilized fully in India and on priority

[Kakkaji]

Here are the official vaccination numbers for today:

COVID-19 Vaccination Update- Day 115

India’s Cumulative Vaccination Coverage exceeds 17.26 Cr doses

More than 5 lakh beneficiaries of age group 18-44 Vaccinated today till 8 pm

More than 24 lakh vaccine doses administered today

The cumulative number of COVID-19 vaccine doses administered in the country stands at 17,26,33,761 as per the 8 pm provisional report today.

5,18,479 beneficiaries of the age group 18-44 years received their first dose of COVID vaccine today and cumulatively 25,52,843 across 30 States/UTs since the start of Phase-3 of the vaccination drive.

As on Day-115 of the vaccination drive (10th May, 2021), total 24,30,017 vaccine doses were given. 10,47,092 beneficiaries were vaccinated for 1st dose and 13,82,925 beneficiaries received 2nd dose of vaccine as per the provisional report till 8 P.M. Final reports would be completed for the day by late tonight.

The daily numbers for 18-44 group are picking up smartly, over 5 lakhs today, mainly due to a few states.

For the above 45 group from the Central Government quota, the focus currently seems to be in completing second doses, rather than giving out more first doses.

[Jarita]

the lootyens presstitutes and the national media are very quiet about it, meaning that this guy is well connected to the eyetalian mafia

among many other restaurants, he owns khan chacha in khan market

Let this sink in

Navneet Kalra procured 7500 Oxygen Concentrators at average of ₹ 17,000 and sold it for ₹ 70,000 each.

via@Sootradhar·9 May

'
The guy is so wealthy that this is chump change for him. There has to be more to this, than mere black marketing.

[vimal]

Hasn't this become a recurring theme. There are vested interest groups hoarding critical supplies to create panic even in this situation. Seems pretty well staged managed like the Onion supply issue. Tejasvi Surya was able to break such a nexus in Bangalore which involved an entire gang of peacefuls on 1 day number of available beds went from zero to 1500 or something.