Congress lauds Centre for expanding vaccination criteria; credits Rahul & Manmohan Singh

On Monday, the Congress party applauded the Union government for allowing COVID-19 vaccination for all persons above the age of 12 from May 1 onwards. However, it claimed that the Centre had merely accepted the suggestions of its party leaders including former Congress president Rahul Gandhi. In a dig at the ruling dispensation, the Sonia Gandhi-led party stressed that this move will go a "long way" in mending "mistakes".

Writing on Twitter, Congress Rajya Sabha MP P Chidambaram attributed this development to the letter sent to Prime Minister Narendra Modi by his predecessor Dr. Manmohan Singh on April 18. At the same time, he stressed the need to provide funds to the manufacturers of the two India-made vaccines and to invoke the provision of compulsory licensing. In his letter dated April 8, the Wayanad MP had advocated opening up inoculation to "those who need it" and giving state governments a greater say in vaccine procurement and distribution. 

On the other hand, Singh asked the Centre to publicise the orders placed on different vaccine producers over the next 6 months. Calling for transparency on the formula for distribution of vaccine doses to states, he also sought flexibility for the state governments to lower the vaccine age cap amongst other suggestions.  A total of 10,81,11,130 persons have been inoculated in India till now, 1,62,58,196 of them have received the second dose of the vaccine too. 

Landmark decision

Apart from COVISHIELD and COVAXIN, the DCGI accepted the recommendations of the Subject Expert Committee of the Central Drugs Standard Control Organisation, paving way for the approval of Sputnik V on April 12. Moreover, the Union government declared that those vaccines that have been granted emergency approval for restricted use by USFDA, EMA, UK MHRA, PMDA Japan, or which are listed in WHO (Emergency Use Listing) will be granted emergency use approval in India. In place of the local clinical trial requirement, the post-approval bridging clinical trial shall be mandated.

The first 100 beneficiaries of such foreign vaccines shall be assessed for 7 days for safety outcomes before it is rolled out for further immunization programme within India. In a huge announcement earlier in the day, the Centre relaxed the age bar for vaccination and mentioned that vaccine manufacturers can supply 50% of its doses to state governments and in the open market. The private hospitals shall have to procure their supplies of the COVID-19 vaccines exclusively from this quota. The private vaccination providers shall transparently declare their self-set vaccination price.

However, they will have to follow all protocols such as being captured on the CoWIN platform and linked to AEFI reporting. At the same time, vaccination shall continue at Government of India vaccination centres for healthcare and frontline workers and those above 45 years. Additionally, the Centre stated that it will allocate vaccine doses to the states from the remaining 50% quota based on factors such as the number of active cases, speed of administration and vaccine wastage.