Three temperature-controlled trucks deployed the vaccines from the Serum Institute facility in Pune.
New Delhi:
The first batch of Covishield, the Serum Institute of India’s coronavirus vaccine, left Pune early this morning, four days before the national inoculation campaign against COVID-19.
Amid tight security, three temperature-controlled trucks left the Serum Institute gates with their precious cargo shortly before 5 a.m. The trucks carried 478 boxes of the vaccines, each box weighed 32 kg, the PTI news agency reported, citing an unidentified official. A “bid” was held before the vehicles left the premises for Pune airport.
From the airport, vaccines are sent to 13 cities.
“Ready, set, set! Hold on India! The vaccine to kill the disease is being loaded onto the plane for distribution across the country,” Pune airport tweeted.
Done, Done, Done!
Support India!
The vaccine to kill the disease is being loaded onto planes for distribution across the country.@AAI_Official@aairewrpic.twitter.com/5lY9i4Tjdk– PuneAirport (@aaipunairport) January 12, 2021
Civil Aviation Minister Hardeep Singh Puri tweeted to say that the vaccines will be shipped from Pune on nine commercial flights.
“Today Air India, SpiceJet and IndiGo Airlines will operate nine flights from Pune with doses of 56.5 lakh to Delhi, Chennai, Kolkata, Guwahati, Shillong, Ahmedabad, Hyderabad, Vijayawada, Bhubaneswar, Patna, Bengaluru, Lucknow and Chandigarh”, tweeted. .
A SpiceJet flight with the vaccines left for the national capital around 8 am.
“We will be taking various vaccine shipments to different cities in India including Guwahati, Kolkata, Hyderabad, Bhubaneswar, Bengaluru, Patna and Vijayawada today. SpiceJet is fully committed and ready to transport the Covid vaccine both within and outside the India – the beginning of a long and decisive phase in India’s fight against the pandemic and SpiceJet is proud to assist in the largest vaccination campaign in human history, “said Ajay Singh, President and CEO of SpiceJet.
The vaccines are also being shipped on two cargo flights to Hyderabad, Vijayawada, Kolkata and Guwahati, PTI reported citing a source.
The shipment for Mumbai will go by road.
The government has ordered Covishield doses of 1.01 crore and plans to purchase a total of 5.60 crore of doses by April, at 200 rupees per dose.
Hindustan Lifecare Limited or HLL, a core company, is the agency that will purchase the vaccines from both the Serum Institute of India and Bharat Biotech.
Two vaccines, the Covishield developed by the University of Oxford and Bharat Biotech’s leading drugmaker AstraZeneca and Covaxin, received emergency use approval from India’s drug controller earlier this month. Both are two-dose vaccines, which should be administered 28 days apart.
The vaccine launch is scheduled for January 16. The government has said that 30 million people, starting with healthcare workers and front-line workers such as police, civil defense personnel and sanitation workers, will receive the vaccine in the first phase.
After them, the other vulnerable group, people over 50 and those with comorbidities such as diabetes and hypertension, will also receive the vaccine.
With contributions from agencies
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