Bhubaneswar: The acute shortage of Covid-19 vaccines can be resolved after the government floats global tender for the procurement of doses from various globally approved leading vaccine agencies and manufacturers.
Director of Health Services Bijay Mohapatra on Tuesday said that the State government would soon fix the modalities for the tender process. “We will sit to discuss the modalities soon for the e-tender process in a day or two,” he added.
Mohapatra said the State would get more benefits after the global tender. “If we float a global tender, we will get more benefits including the availability of more vaccines at cheap prices. We can also get more approved agencies through which the supply chain can increase,” Mohapatra said.
There are two committees formed to supervise the entire process. The technical committee comprising health and finance experts would look into the quality and quantity of the vaccines to be procured from leading manufacturers while the managerial panel will take care of business and other aspects.
Director of Medical Education and Training Prof CBK Mohanty will head the ten-member Technical Committee while the other one will be led by OSMC Managing Director Yamini Sarangi.
Currently, the supply chain of vaccines is very low nationally and internationally due to the rise in demands. “Earlier, we used to administer 2.80 lakh doses a day, but now the figure has drastically come down to 40,000-50,000 per day,” he said.
Mohapatra further claimed that vaccines can prevent a person from infection. If someone gets infected, the vaccine can reduce the intensity of the disease. “So, we have aimed at vaccinating more and more people to break the chain of infections and bring the Covid crisis under control,” he pointed out.
Notably, the decision to float a global tender for Covid vaccines was taken at a state Cabinet meeting chaired by Chief Minister Naveen Patnaik yesterday.