Day after fire, Serum dispatches Covishield to Myanmar, Seychelles, Mauritius

Pune, January 22: A day after massive fire, the Serum Institute of India on Friday dispatched consignments of the Covishield vaccine for Myanmar, Seychelles and Mauritius. The flight for Myanmar was scheduled to take off at 6:40 am today from Mumbai while the vaccine consignment for Mauritius and Seychelles was sent at 11 am. With this a consignment containing 1.5 million doses of Covishield vaccine reached Yangon, Myanmar today.

 

 

Meanwhile, a consignment of 50,000 doses of Covishield vaccine is scheduled to reach Seychelles as part of India's vaccine donation programme. Seychelles is only among the four Indian Ocean countries to receive the Covishield vaccine, manufactured by the SII.

 

Five people died in a massive fire that broke out at the Serum Institute of India's (SII) site near Pune on Thursday, damaging equipment worth hundreds of crores at India's top vaccine manufacturer. The five who died were construction workers whose bodies were recovered by the fire department. However, the manufacturing of Serum's Covid-19 vaccine Covishield, which is produced at another site in Manjri, hasn't been affected by the major fire, Serum Institute CEO Adar Poonawalla has confirmed.

 

The donation of the vaccines under the Vaccine Maitri demonstrates India's role as a reliable partner of Seychelles and net security provider in the Indian Ocean Region. This is also reflective of India's special relations with Seychelles and the central place enjoyed by Seychelles in Prime Minister Modi's vision of SAGAR- 'Security and Growth for All in the Region'.

 

India's Ministry of External Affairs had announced a COVID vaccine rollout for Bhutan, Maldives, Bangladesh, Nepal, Myanmar and Seychelles from Wednesday which comes in line with its 'Neighbourhood First Policy'.