Bharat Biotech to boost Covaxin production to 70 crore doses per year

Hyderabad: The Bharat Biotech International Ltd on Tuesday said it will ramp up production of its Covid-19 vaccine Covaxin to about 70 crore doses on an annual basis.

The expansion in production comes after the Centre provided Rs 150 crore grant. "Inactivated vaccines, while highly safe, are extremely complex and expensive to manufacture, resulting in lower yields when compared to live virus vaccines," the Hyderabad-based company said in a statement on Tuesday.

"The company is able to expand Covaxin manufacturing capacity in a short timeline, mainly due to the availability of new specially designed BSL-3 facilities, first of its kind for manufacturing in India that have been repurposed and pre-existing expertise and know how to manufacture, test and release highly purified inactivated viral vaccines," the company said.