NEW DELHI: Gavi the co-lead in the global vaccine sharing facility COVAX has revealed that India is legally bound to ship coronavirus vaccines to them, the law could harm Serum Institute of India’s (SII) efforts to boost domestic supplies.India, where infections have surged to 13.06 million, suspended all major exports of vaccines last month to fill demand at home, forcing the world’s biggest vaccine maker to divert nearly all its production to the domestic market.”The agreement is legally binding and served as a basis for the first-round allocation document, which has been communicated to all participating economies,” a Gavi spokeswoman said in an email.
The pact specified Gavi would receive from SII 1.1 billion doses of either the AstraZeneca vaccine or that of Novavax, with 200 million committed, and the rest on option.SII partner AstraZeneca has already issued it a legal notice over delays to other shipments, even as many Indian states have complained of a shortage facing priority recipients.Gavi said its pact with SII took effect when the World Health Organisation approved the AstraZeneca shot on February 15, after a source said SII had originally been supposed to send doses to COVAX only from May.”SII has pledged that, alongside supplying India, it will prioritise the COVAX multilateral solution for equitable distribution,” Gavi added.COVAX had expected a total of more than 100 million doses from SII between February and May, excluding supplies for India, but has so far received only about 18.2 million.
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