This Pune lab can now approve Covid vaccines | Economic Times

The Centre has notified the National Centre for Cell Science (NCCS) as another laboratory to approve Covid-19 vaccine batches. So far, only Central Drugs Laboratory (CDL), Kasauli, had been approving the vaccine batches.The Centre has notified the Pune-based laboratory as another facility to approve Covid-19 vaccines to ensure its smooth availability for the on-going public immunisation drive. As per norms, every batch of vaccine manufactured by a company has to be tested by CDL and passed. This quality testing is compulsory to ensure that all vaccine batches adhere to the composition passed by the Central Drugs Standard Control Organisation (CDSCO). 84000166With the government adding more vaccines, there is an unprecedented pressure on CDL, which has traditionally received 7,000 batches of immunobiologicals per year for testing or pre-release certification. CDL has already crossed this limit since the rollout of the Covid-19 immunisation drive on January 16. So far, it has already passed close to 50 crore vaccine doses. Increased pace of passing of vaccines is essential for the government to reach the target of inoculating 1 crore people daily. With the government scaling up the pace of immunisation starting June 21, the approvals would also need to pick up. A senior government told ET, “Since NCCS is in Pune, it will also help in increasing the speed of approval as all the vaccines are being manufactured in Pune and Hyderabad right now.” Sputnik V’s commercial launch has been delayed because of supply constraints and adequate doses being passed by CDL.