Haffkine Biopharma, a Maharashtra state PSU proposed to produce 22.8 crore Covaxin doses per annum under technology transfer arrangement with Bharat Biotech.

The production will take place at the Parel complex of the company in Mumbai.

Dr. Sandeep Rathod, managing director of Haffkine BioPharma stated, “For undertaking production of Covaxin, Haffkine Biopharma has been provided with Rs. 65 crore grant by the Centre and Rs. 94 crore from the Government of Maharashtra,” he added.

“We have been given a timeline of eight months and the work is being executed on a war footing. The vaccine production process involves two stages – drug substance and final drug product. For production of drug substance we need to build a bio safety level 3 (BSL 3) facility, while Haffkine already has the fill finish facility,” said Rathod, the doctor turned IAS officer. BSL 3 is a safety standard applicable to such facilities where work involves microbes which can cause serious disease via inhalation route.

‘Enhancing vaccine production capacity using Public sectors assets will go a long way in building production capacity of vaccines in our country to support the massive vaccination drive” said, Dr Renu Swarup, secretary Department of Biotechnology and Chairperson BIRAC (Biotechnology Industry Research Assistance Council).

Haffkine BioPharmaceutical Corporation Ltd is an offshoot of the 122 year old Haffkine Institute, which is one of the oldest biomedical research institutes in the country, named after the Russian bacteriologist Dr Waldemar Haffkine, who invented the plague vaccine.