Editor’s Pick: Centre-State spar as India faces vaccine shortage

(The Editor's Pick is a new newsletter from The Hindu that provides a snapshot of the most important stories from today's edition of our newspaper, along with a note from our top editors on why we chose to give prominence to these stories.)

On a day on which India reported the highest number of new cases since the pandemic began, the country's vaccination efforts descended into a political clash. Union Health Minister Harsh Vardhan slammed Maharashtra, along with Delhi and Chhattisgarh, for complaining about low vaccine supplies and blamed the non-NDA governments in these States for mismanaging the vaccination drive. He said that as per data, the level of vaccination of healthcare workers, frontline workers and seniors were below the national average in these States. Though the Union Minister insisted that there were enough vaccines to meet the current vaccination plan, he mentioned that "supplies were limited".

The Maharashtra Health Minister had earlier said that the State had vaccine doses to sustain the inoculation drive only for the next three days. Chhattisgarh had also complained of erratic supplies from the Centre, with vaccines almost running out on Monday. India is currently administering around 4 million doses daily under its plan of inoculating those above 45 years of age. As the number of daily cases spike at an unprecedented rate, there is call for the vaccinations to be extended to all. However, the country's capacity to produce the two approved vaccines -- Covishield and Covaxin -- is stretched thin.

Covishield manufacturer SII has the capacity to make 65 million doses a month but as a private firm it also has export commitments. Covaxin manufacturer Bharat Biotech is only at 4 million doses month. With a need to replenish India's vaccine stocks every 10 days, this level of production will keep the country constantly on the edge of shortage, and without many options to scale up coverage.

While the Centre's case that Maharashtra, Delhi and Chhattisgarh have not matched the national average on vaccinations may be true, the numbers also make it evident that India's vaccine supply chain is stretched. As the cases rise, there is a need to ramp up the number of daily inoculations as well as extend access to the larger population, as many other nations have done. This larger picture is what makes the story on the Centre's war of words with the non-NDA States, important.

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