Serum Institute of India CEO Adar Poonawalla and Bharat Biotech director Dr Krishna Ella have during a joint statement Tuesday said that it had been their combined intent to develop, manufacture and provide the COVID-19 vaccines for India and globally.
“Both companies respect the great work being carried out by each other and put behind us the miscommunication and misunderstanding caused during the past week. We are fully aware of the importance of vaccines for people and countries alike, we hereby communicate our joint pledge to provide global access for our COVID-19 vaccines,” Poonawalla and Dr Ella said within the statement.
On Monday, Dr Ella at a virtual conference had strongly lashed out against those that had criticised the accelerated emergency use authorisation (EUA) that was accorded to Covaxin – the company’s Covid 19 vaccine. He had told reporters that it had been unfair to be at the receiving end of such backlash once they had haunted “200 per cent honest clinical trials”.
He had also, without naming anyone, criticised companies who had branded their vaccine like water. Here it's going to be recalled that Poonawalla had during a TV interview claimed that there have been three vaccines Pfizer, Moderna and AstraZeneca with proven efficacy and therefore the rest were like ‘water’.
Dr Ella had also raised questions on why nobody was questioning the Oxford-AstraZeneca data. He had also said their data on Covaxin was published in a minimum of five reputed journals. He had also firmly said that Covaxin was a vaccine and not a backup as suggested by some experts.
While queries to both firms remained unanswered, SII and Bharat Biotech issued a press release on Tuesday stating the more important task ahead of them is saving the lives and livelihoods of populations in India and therefore the world. “Vaccines are a worldwide public health good and that they have the facility to save lots of lives and accelerate the return to economic normalcy at the earliest,” the statement read.
“Now that two COVID-19 vaccines have been issued EUA in India, the focus is on manufacture, supply and distribution, such that populations that need it the most receive high quality, safe and efficacious vaccines. Both our companies are fully engaged in this activity and consider it our duty to the nation and the world at large to ensure a smooth rollout of vaccines. Each of our companies continue their COVID-19 vaccines development activities as planned,” Poonawalla and Dr Ella said.
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