Telangana to float global tenders for vaccines

Hyderabad: In the wake of acute shortage of corona vaccines and people virtually facing a lot of trouble at vaccination centres, the Telangana government has decided to procure the vaccines through global tendering.

It may be mentioned here that on Monday, the Andhra Pradesh government had also taken a similar decision. Officials of Medical and Health department are in consultation with the vaccine manufacturing units from the US, UK and Russia. Officials also said that the government has got assurance from Hyderabad-based Bharat Biotech, which manufactures Covaxin, for the supply of nearly 50 lakh doses once the production increases. But it would take about two months. The state requires at least 4 crore doses to vaccinate all those who are above 18 years of age.

The availability of Covaxin and Covishield would not be more than one crore doses and to meet the demand for another 3 crore doses, the officials said the only option before the government is to go in for global tendering.

The authorities said the Telangana State Medical Infrastructure Development Corporation would issue notification for the procurement of vaccines soon.

In view of the shortage of Remdesivir injections, oxygen scarcity and other medicines, the state Cabinet which met here on Tuesday constituted a Task Force headed by Industry Minister KT Rama Rao. The regular procurement and supply of the medicines and injections would be monitored by the task force.