NEW DELHI: India’s Biological E. will produce the Johnson & Johnson Covid-19 vaccine alongside its own candidate, its managing director told Reuters on Tuesday, which could boost the country’s overall supplies amid a shortage.
“The infrastructure and plants are completely separate for both the products and we will be producing both independent of each other,” Mahima Datla said in a text message, declining to give any timeline or other details.
She told Reuters in February that Biological E. was looking to contract-manufacture about 600 million doses of the J&J vaccine annually. India’s government, however, did not factor in any production of J&J this year in the country in a list of likely vaccine output released last week.
J&J confirmed to Reuters it was working with Biological E. on manufacturing its vaccine.
“We believe Biological E. will be an important part of our global Covid-19 vaccine supply network, where multiple manufacturing sites are involved in the production of our vaccine across different facilities, sometimes in different countries and continents, before the vaccine can be distributed,” a J&J India spokesperson said in an email.
J&J said last month it had sought permission to conduct a local clinical trial in India for its single-dose vaccine.
Biological E., based in the southern Indian city of Hyderabad, also plans to produce 75 million to 80 million doses of its own vaccine a month from August. The drug has been developed with Baylor College of Medicine in Houston and Dynavax Technologies Corp.
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