New Delhi: Prime Minister Narendra Modi will hold a meeting with the representatives of vaccine manufacturing companies via video conferencing on Tuesday evening.
During the meeting, he is likely to discuss the capacity enhancement of the Covid-19 vaccine to cater to a larger population under vaccination drive, a senior health Ministry official said.
On April 19, the Government has decided to cover the people above 18 years of age from May 1 in the third phase of the vaccination drive which will also augment a huge demand for shots, the official added.
Recently, many states have flagged the shortage of vaccine and alleged that due to shortage of doses, many centers were closed despite the Government’s claim that there was no paucity of vaccine in the country.
After Covishield and Covaxin, the Government has granted permission to inject the third Covid-19 vaccine ‘Gam-COVID-Vac’ combined vector vaccine, popularly called Sputnik-V, in emergency situations. The Drugs Controller General India (DCGI) gave its nod for the emergency use of the vaccine based on recommendations of the Subject Expert Committee (SEC) and careful consideration.
The meeting would be the third interaction with focus groups after doctors and pharma companies yesterday by Mr Modi. He also reviewed status of the availability oxygen in the country on April 16.