New Delhi: India is now manufacturing active pharmaceutical ingredients (APIs) — raw materials to produce medicines — of drugs like paracetamol, azithromycin and dexamethasone that are widely used for the management of Covid-19 symptoms, a health ministry review meeting concluded Tuesday.
The country is currently importing APIs worth Rs 35,000 crore and exporting these raw materials worth Rs 33,000 crore, senior officials who were present in the meeting said.
Following the conduct of Covid-19 drills across the country Tuesday — to check the level of preparedness of hospitals — the health ministry found that of the 3,37,710 available isolation beds for coronavirus patients, 2,79,202 are currently functional.
The ministry also found that of the 2,82,229 oxygen beds, 2,45,894 are functional, and of the 70,073 ICU beds, 64711 are functional. Of the 57,286 ICU beds with ventilators, 49,236 are functional.
About 88 per cent of 70,996 ventilators available are currently functional and 93 per cet (11,830) of the PSA (pressure swing adsorption) oxygen plants are working. Around 94 per cent of 6,63,547 oxygen cylinders are functional and 96 per cent of 23,7003 oxygen concentrators are in service.
In the last two days, 6,000 international travellers have been tested for the virus at airports and 39 of them were found to be Covid positive.
A senior health ministry functionary, who did not want to be named, told ThePrint, “We are fully prepared, though truth be told what has happened in China is happening because their vaccine has failed. Our vaccines have proved effective against Omicron which means they will be effective against all the different types (such as BF.7). We did a review yesterday (Tuesday) and found that we are now manufacturing all the Covid-appropriate APIs such as for medicines like paracetamol, azithromycin and dexamethasone within the country. This is a result of the steps we took right after the first wave.”
The government of India has tasked the NTAGI (National Technical Advisory Group on Immunisation) to look at the feasibility and the need for a fourth vaccine dose even as the uptake of the third or precaution dose remains low, with just about one in four eligible people having taken the shot.
In a meeting held last week with Health Minister Mansukh Mandaviya, doctors representing various medical associations had raised the demand for a fourth vaccine dose for healthcare workers but top sources in the health ministry have told ThePrint that there is currently no plan for a fourth dose.
Also read: Bharat Biotech’s booster nasal vaccine on CoWIN from today as India strengthens Covid response
Testing vaccines & drugs on BF.7
The current surge of Covid cases in China is believed to have been fuelled by the BF.7 variant. This variant was first detected in India around July and so far, about four cases have been detected in the country.
The government of India has asked scientists to test the efficacy of vaccines and medicines available in India on this variant.
“The results will be available in another 8-10 days. We had isolated the virus long back,” said the official quoted above.
Health ministry sources also claimed that the current surge has been triggered by the fact that though BF.7 infections are found to be largely mild, the variant is estimated to have an R value of about 16 — which means that each individual who catches it can infect 16 others. “For omicron that number was 3-4,” the official added.
However, sources in the health ministry also said that while an announcement about the availability of Bharat Biotech’s nasal vaccine against Covid was made last week, it now seems that the vaccine doses may actually take a month or so to be available.
ThePrint reached Bharat Biotech for a response on this. This report will be updated as and when they reply.
Also read: India’s doctor-patient ratio better than WHO norm of 1:1000, government tells Rajya Sabha