The Biden administration has agreed to support waiving intellectual property (IP) restrictions on COVID-19 vaccines at the World Trade Organization (WTO), a breakthrough in the global fight against the pandemic that can empower governments to tackle vaccine scarcity and inequity.U.S. Trade Representative Katherine Tai announced the administration’s position in a FILE – A logo is seen at the headquarters of the World Trade Organization in Geneva, Switzerland, June 2, 2020.Biden agrees; now what?Now that Biden has agreed to support the waiver, it doesn’t mean U.S. pharmaceutical companies must start giving away vaccine recipes so developing countries can make their own.The WTO is a consensus-based organization and cannot move forward unless the European Union, which is against the waiver, and everyone else agrees. Once all WTO members agree, the next steps would be for countries to implement it at the national level by removing legal risks that hinder production and supply by alternative producers. To clarify these implementation options, countries must start text-based negotiations at the WTO, going through each item of the complex and multilayered IP legal requirements — a process that could take months, or even years.”I’m not going to put odds on how likely it is to find an agreement,” said WTO spokesman Keith Rockwell, summarizing the WTO closed-door General Council meeting on the TRIPS waiver Wednesday.But he said there was consensus on the need for wider access to COVID-19 vaccines and treatments.”When people begin to voice very clearly their share objectives, it makes it easier to get to ‘yes,’ ” Rockwell said.There is not a single “recipe” for a COVID-19 vaccine — the vaccines are complex in terms of ingredients, manufacturing technology, delivery vehicles, etc., and each vaccine has dozens, if not hundreds, of IPs attached, many of them under patent pending litigation, making the granting of waivers an even more complicated and lengthy process.FILE – Boxes of the Johnson & Johnson COVID-19 vaccine are seen at the McKesson Corp., amid the coronavirus disease outbreak, in Shepherdsville, Ky., March 1, 2021.There are many complex challenges in scaling up COVID-19 vaccine production. The waiver is just one tool and does not offer a blanket solution, said Yuanqiong Hu, a senior legal and policy adviser with Doctors Without Borders, one of the organizations that support the TRIPS waiver.But as an important enabler, Hu added, “the earlier the waiver can be adopted, the sooner its impact can be realized.”If countries are given the permission and know-how to produce vaccines, waiver proponents say, they don’t have to wait in line while pharmaceutical companies fulfill orders from rich countries who have the resources to do so.But even if a full waiver is not approved, proponents are hoping the pressure will become leverage to force vaccine producers to ramp up global manufacturing capacity via additional licensing agreements, or donate or sell doses at a reduced cost.TRIPS waiver opponentsDrug manufacturers, including Pfizer and Moderna, oppose the waiver, saying that easing patent rules FILE – Microsoft founder Bill Gates holds a vaccine for meningitis during a news conference at U.N. headquarters in Geneva, Switzerland, May 17, 2011.Another big opponent is Microsoft co-founder Bill Gates, whose Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation sponsored Gavi, the Vaccine Alliance — the driving force behind COVAX, the U.N. mechanism to improve low- and middle-income countries’ access to vaccines. Despite more than two decades of philanthropic work to immunize the world’s poor, Gates is a fierce defender of IP protection.On Wednesday, WTO Director-General Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala spoke to representatives from developing and developed countries and again urged them to quickly agree on this issue, over which countries have been at odds for six months.The ‘third way’Opponents insist a waiver would not help accelerate vaccine access or address supply chain and logistical constraints. It would still take a long time for governments to set up factories, train staff and procure materials to make vaccines.They say the faster and better way to do it is through technology transfer partnerships and licensing agreements, such as the one between AstraZeneca and the Serum Institute of India, which produced doses for COVAX. The agreement has been halted by the government of Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi, which wants to prioritize doses for its own populations as it deals with another wave of COVID-19 cases.Licensing agreements, including those between Britain’s AstraZeneca and Brazil’s Fiocruz, or the Chinese company Sinovac Biotech and the Indonesian firm Bio Farma, have shown that middle-income countries have the capacity to produce vaccine doses within months after technology transfer.These licensing agreements and other means of technology transfer have been praised by Okonjo-Iweala as the “third way,” an alternative to vaccine protectionism and waiving IP rights.However, these agreements can include restrictions — for example, geographical limitations on where, when and to whom the doses can be sold. Most bilateral agreements on COVID-19 vaccine production are contract manufacturing agreements through which the contracted entity manufactures on behalf of a licenser that maintains full control over the use of its technology, the volume of production, and where and at what prices vaccines may be supplied.The Biden administration said it would continue to ramp up efforts, working with the private sector and all possible partners to expand vaccine manufacturing and distribution, and increase the raw materials needed to produce the vaccines.VOA’s Katherine Gypson contributed to this report.
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A senior Indian government scientific adviser warned Wednesday that a third wave of coronavirus infections would sweep the country as it struggles with the devastating effects of the current wave that officially claimed nearly 4,000 lives in the course of one day.The government’s principal scientific adviser, K. Vijay Raghavan, issued the warning as the World Health Organization said in its weekly report that India accounted for almost half the cases reported globally last week and about a quarter of all fatalities.“Phase 3 is inevitable, given the high levels of circulating virus,” Raghavan told a news briefing in New Delhi. “But it is not clear on what timescale this phase 3 will occur … We should prepare for new waves.”India’s crisis is aggravated by a critical lack of oxygen needed to treat critically ill patients, along with the raw materials needed to manufacture doses of the COVID-19 vaccine. While India is home to the Serum Institute of India, the world’s largest vaccine manufacturer, only 2% of the country’s 1.3 billion people have been vaccinated, according to local reports. COVID-19 is the disease caused by the coronavirus.Sorry, but your browser cannot support embedded video of this type, you can
download this video to view it offline.Download File360p | 10 MB480p | 15 MB540p | 20 MB720p | 38 MB1080p | 81 MBOriginal | 243 MB Embed” />Copy Download AudioTo help address the oxygen shortage, India’s Supreme Court ordered the government Wednesday to submit a plan to meet oxygen needs in New Dehli hospitals within one day.Prime Minister Narendra Modi and his Bharatiya Janata Party have been roundly criticized over the last several weeks for holding massive election rallies in West Bengal. Health experts have suggested the rallies may have contributed to a record surge in the state.Other political parties also held rallies there.Award-winning author Arundhati Roy called for Modi to resign in an opinion piece that was published Tuesday by the independent news website Scroll.in.“This is a crisis of your making,” she wrote. “You cannot solve it. You can only make it worse … So please go.”In a related development, Agence France-Presse reported that India’s Reserve Bank has pledged to provide $6.7 billion in cheap financing for the country’s vaccine makers, hospitals and other health firms.
  
The United Nations Children’s Fund announced shipments of medical supplies to India Wednesday, including 2 million face shields and 200,000 surgical masks. UNICEF also said it is supporting other endeavors in India, such as the acquisition of 25 oxygen plants for hospitals in the northeast and in the western state of Maharashtra.  India’s Health Ministry reported another 382,315 new cases of coronavirus cases on Wednesday, including 3,780 COVID-related deaths. The South Asian nation has more than 20 million total coronavirus infections, second only behind the United States, and 226,188 fatalities, according to Johns Hopkins Coronavirus Resource Center. Sorry, but your browser cannot support embedded video of this type, you can
download this video to view it offline.Download File360p | 4 MB480p | 5 MB540p | 8 MB720p | 16 MB1080p | 32 MBOriginal | 163 MB Embed” />Copy Download AudioIntellectual property rights
 
Member nations of the World Trade Organization were wrapping up two days of talks in Geneva Wednesday on waiving intellectual property rights on new COVID-19 vaccines.  
 
Ambassadors from the WTO’s 164 member states had been debating a proposal first floated by South Africa and India last October that would temporarily lift patent rights held by pharmaceutical companies that developed the vaccines. Supporters of the proposal say the waiver will allow for the faster manufacture of vaccines for use by developing countries, where vaccination rates have lagged behind those of wealthier nations.
 
But pharmaceutical companies claim that granting the waiver could hurt future innovation and will not lead to the quick production of vaccines.   
 
Dozens of civil society groups and former heads of state, including former British Prime Minister Gordon Brown and Mikhail Gorbachev of the former Soviet Union, have urged U.S. President Joe Biden to support the proposed waiver. More than 100 members of the Democratic-led U.S. House of Representatives signed a letter to Biden, urging him to support the proposal.   
 
The International Network of Civil Liberties Organizations also urged Biden to support the proposal, saying in a letter it would help “ensure universal and equitable access to COVID-19 vaccines.”
 
Biden said he has not made a decision on the matter. The proposal must be agreed on by all the WTO member nations.
 Global tracker
 
Also on Wednesday, Germany and the World Health Organization announced plans to establish a global monitoring operation to help prevent future threats like the current pandemic.
 
The Berlin-based “global hub for pandemic and epidemic intelligence” would track and monitor “exposed gaps in the global systems for pandemic and epidemic intelligence,” WHO Director-General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus said.
 
The monitoring center will get about $36 million from Germany and search for funds from other sources.   
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The head of the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) said current projections see COVID-19 cases remaining low and dropping sharply by July, provided vaccination rates remain high and people continue to observe basic prevention practices.At a briefing, CDC Director Rochelle Walensky said the projections are based on a study published Wednesday by the CDC. The study used data taken from recent trends to create models showing what could happen if current vaccination and prevention practices, such as mask use and social distancing, continue.Walensky said nationwide, U.S. COVID-19 statistics continue to trend well, with the daily average of new cases falling by 12%, to 42,494 per day, while average daily hospitalizations dropped by 9.5%. She said daily average deaths also fell by nearly 1%.But she said the wild card in the CDC models is variant coronavirus strains that cause COVID-19. Walensky said data show current vaccines are performing well against the predominant variants, so it is even more imperative to get more people vaccinated.  To that end, White House COVID-19 Response Team Senior Adviser Andy Slavitt announced that anyone in the United States can simply send a mobile text message with their Zip (postal) code to GETVAXED and they will be sent three vaccination locations near them. He said people can also get information on where they might receive a preferred vaccine.  Slavitt said the texts will also provide information on how people can get a free ride to a vaccine location through ride share services. He said those without access to mobile devices or the internet will be provided with telephone numbers they can call to obtain the information.Slavitt said the measures are all part of meeting goals laid out in a speech Tuesday by President Joe Biden. The president said he would like to see 70% of all Americans with at least one vaccination and 160 million Americans fully vaccinated by July 4, the U.S. Independence Day holiday. As of Tuesday, the CDC reports just less than 45% of people in the U.S. have received at least one shot while more than 106 million – 32% – of Americans are fully vaccinated.
 
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In marking World Hand Hygiene Day, the World Health Organization is stressing the importance of good hand hygiene practices in stopping the spread of deadly infections. It says this is especially true at a time when the world is battling the coronavirus, which causes the COVID-19 disease.
 
COVID has dramatically amplified the importance of hand washing. The head of WHO’s infection prevention and control, Benedetta Allegranzi, says this simple action can prevent the risk of transmitting the infection, when used as part of a comprehensive package of public health measures.
    
“Effective hand hygiene also prevents any infection acquired in health care, the spread of antimicrobial resistance and other emerging health threats. Hand hygiene is a simple action that has a central role in contributing to quality care and to the whole of society efforts to prevent infection spread and saves lives,” Allegranzi said.
    
A WHO survey of 88 countries finds low-and-middle-income countries have made significantly lower progress than high-income countries in implementing hand hygiene and infection prevention programs.
 
The report notes one in four health care facilities in poorer countries does not have basic water services and one in three lacks hand hygiene supplies.
 
Allegranzi said the poorer countries lack the money needed to shore up their crumbling health care infrastructure. Consequently, she noted, most do not meet the minimal requirements to make a significant dent in reducing often life-threatening infections.
    
“For example, in some low-and-middle-income countries, only one in 10 have workers who practice proper hand hygiene while caring for patients at high-risk of health care susceptibility infection in intensive care units.  While, also in high-income countries, hand hygiene compliance rarely exceeds 60% to 70%.”
 
WHO reports every year, health care-acquired infections affect millions of patients and health workers globally. Europe alone, it says, records nearly nine million infections yearly. The U.N. agency says highly effective and low-cost hand hygiene strategies are available that could reduce these infections by half.
 
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Relentless wind and rain keeps pummeling much of the southeastern United States, spawning tornadoes, sparking a flash flood emergency in Alabama and damaging homes from Texas to Virginia. The storms have prompted boat rescues and toppled trees and power lines.
Crews were preparing to continue cleaning up debris and assessing destruction across the region early Wednesday, as some schools canceled classes or moved them online due to damage on campuses and surrounding areas.
The National Weather Service’s prediction center warned Wednesday morning that flash flooding also could now affect the Central Gulf Coast with storms shifting southeast and rain continuing to soak much of the region.
The storms have been responsible for at least three deaths and dozens of injuries this week, and more than 200,000 customers were without power from Arkansas to Maryland early Wednesday, including about 75,000 in Alabama, about 66,000 in Mississippi, about 13,800 in Georgia and about 25,700 in Virginia, according to the website poweroutage.us.
Torrential rains Tuesday near Birmingham, Alabama, dumped more than 7 inches (17.7 centimeters) of water in a few afternoon hours, causing flooding problems across much of the state’s most populous areas.
Emergency Management officials in the area urged residents to stay off roads because so many were flooded, including some downtown. In the Birmingham suburb of Homewood, fire department rescuers in a small boat paddled past submerged cars in a parking lot, slowly removing more than a dozen people from the waters surrounding an apartment complex.
Strong winds blowing behind a line of storms were toppling trees across central Alabama, where soil was saturated with water, and lightning struck a church in central Alabama, causing extensive damage from a fire. The National Weather Service in Birmingham said late Tuesday it planned to send two crews to Greene and Tuscaloosa Counties to assess wind and possible tornado damage from storms that started Sunday.
Strong winds and heavy rain whipped through Mississippi’s capital city of Jackson late Tuesday while thunder rattled windows. The high winds cracked some limbs off trees and sent them onto nearby houses. The storms left streets littered with branches and leaves.
At least eight people were injured when storms that brought tornadoes to Texas flipped tractor-trailers on an interstate and damaged structures.
In Tennessee, at least 11 counties were hit by possible EF-0 tornadoes, according to an official with the National Weather Service in Nashville. A tornado that struck Virginia’s Northumberland County near the Chesapeake Bay destroyed one home and severely damaged a few others Monday.
On Monday, tornadoes also touched down in South Carolina and southern Kentucky while a possible tornado hit West Virginia.
In Mississippi, forecasters confirmed 12 tornadoes Sunday evening and night, including the Yazoo City twister, which stretched for 30 miles (50 kilometers), and another tornado that moved through suburbs south of Jackson, producing a damage track 910 meters (1,000 yards) wide.
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Member nations of the World Trade Organization are wrapping up two days of talks in  Geneva Wednesday focused on waiving intellectual property rights on new COVID-19 vaccines.  Ambassadors from the WTO’s 164 member states have been debating a proposal first proposed by South Africa and India back in October that would temporarily lift patent rights held by pharmaceutical companies that developed the vaccines.  Supporters of the proposal say the waiver will allow for the faster manufacturing of COVID-19 vaccines for use by developing countries, where vaccination rates have lagged behind those of wealthier nations. But pharmaceutical companies claim that granting the waiver could hurt future innovation and will not lead to the quick production of coronavirus vaccines.   Dozens of civil society groups and former heads of state, including former British Prime Minister Gordon Brown and Mikhail Gorbachev of the former Soviet Union have urged U.S. President Joe Biden to support the proposed waiver. More than 100 members of the Democratic-led U.S. House of Representatives signed a letter to President Biden also urging him to support the proposal.   Biden says he has not made a decision on the matter.  The proposal must be agreed on by all 164 WTO member nations. India
In a related development, Agence France-Presse is reporting that India’s Reserve Bank has pledged to provide $6.7 billion in cheap financing for the country’s vaccine makers, hospitals and other health firms as the world’s second-most populous country is mired in a catastrophic surge of the virus. Workers load empty oxygen cylinders onto a supply truck for refilling, at the Medical College and Hospital, amid the spread of the coronavirus disease (COVID-19), in Kolkata, India, May 5, 2021.”The devastating speed with which the virus affects different regions of the country has to be matched by swift and wide-ranging actions,” said Reserve Bank of India governor Shaktikanta Das in making the announcement.   India’s Health Ministry reported another 382,315 new cases of coronavirus cases on Wednesday, including 3,780 COVID-related deaths. The South Asian nation has more than 20 million total coronavirus infections, second only behind the United States, and 226,188 fatalities, according to Johns Hopkins Coronavirus Resource Center. 
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Foreign ministers from the Group of Seven wealthy democracies turn their attention to issues of global interest including coronavirus vaccines, climate change and education for girls on Wednesday as they close three days of talks in London. “I think COVAX and the ability to fund it, get vaccines to the most vulnerable countries, what we do about the surplus domestic supply, all of those issues again, really good opportunity with the G-7, together with our Indo-Pacific partners, to talk all of that through and come up with positive answers,” British Foreign Secretary Dominic Raab said Tuesday. With Britain hosting the ministerial talks, U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken met with British Prime Minister Boris Johnson, whose office highlighted the importance of global access to COVID-19 vaccines. “The Prime Minister and Secretary Blinken agreed that the global roll out of vaccines will be key to defeating the coronavirus pandemic. They underlined the importance of G-7 work in this area, including efforts to increase international manufacturing capability,” a Downing Street spokesman said.Trilateral meeting with Japan and South Korea on the sidelines of the G7 foreign ministers meeting in London, May 5, 2021.Tuesday’s G-7 meetings included a focus on China. A senior U.S. State Department official told reporters there was broad agreement among the ministers, “both the fact that we all want China to be an integral member of the international order, but to do that, it has to play by the rules of that international order.” The official cited concern about China’s human rights record and its “threatening and aggressive behavior in the South China Sea and other areas around its border.” Blinken also said Tuesday the G-7 nations want to end the 10-year civil war in Syria. “My @G7 counterparts and I reaffirmed our commitment to a political resolution for ending the conflict in Syria and support to the reauthorization of the U.N. cross-border aid mechanism,” Blinken tweeted.My @G7 counterparts and I reaffirmed our commitment to a political resolution for ending the conflict in Syria and support to the reauthorization of the UN cross-border aid mechanism. We’ll continue working to advance all aspects of UNSCR 2254 and end the suffering of Syrians.— Secretary Antony Blinken (@SecBlinken) May 4, 2021He said the group would work to advance all parts of a 2015 U.N. Security Council resolution that calls for a cease-fire in Syria, along with a Syrian-led political process with a new constitution and elections. The G-7 ministerial talks are laying the foundation for a summit of leaders from those countries in June, also in Britain.       In addition to Britain and the United States, the G-7 includes Canada, France, Germany, Italy and Japan. Australia, India, South Africa, South Korea and Brunei are also taking part in this week’s talks.          After the G-7 meetings, Blinken is scheduled to travel to Ukraine to meet with President Volodymyr Zelenskiy and other senior government officials.          State Department spokesman Ned Price said in a statement that Blinken will “reaffirm unwavering U.S. support for Ukraine’s sovereignty and territorial integrity in the face of Russia’s ongoing aggression.”
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A Malian woman gave birth to nonuplets in Morocco on Tuesday, and all nine babies are “doing well,” her government said, although Moroccan authorities had yet to confirm what would be an extremely rare case.    Mali’s government flew 25-year-old Halima Cisse, a woman from the northern part of the West African state, to Morocco for better care on March 30. She was initially believed to have been carrying septuplets. Cases of women successfully carrying septuplets to term are rare; nonuplets, even rarer. Moroccan health ministry spokesman Rachid Koudhari said he had no knowledge of such a multiple birth having taken place in one of the country’s hospitals.   But Mali’s health ministry said in a statement that Cisse had given birth to five girls and four boys by cesarean section. “The mother and babies are doing well so far,” Mali’s Health Minister Fanta Siby told AFP, adding that she had been kept informed by the Malian doctor who accompanied Cisse to Morocco.   They are due to return home in several weeks’ time, she added. Doctors had been concerned about Cisse’s health, according to local press reports, as well as her babies’ chances of survival.  Mali’s health ministry said in a statement that ultrasound examinations conducted in both Mali and Morocco had suggested that Cisse was carrying seven babies. Siby offered her congratulations to “the medical teams of Mali and Morocco, whose professionalism is at the origin of the happy outcome of this pregnancy.” 
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President Biden set a goal of reducing U.S. greenhouse gas emissions by half by 2030. His pledge to a virtual summit of world leaders in April is welcomed by those hit hardest by climate change and looking for as much quick action as possible.  VOA’s Arash Arabasadi has more.  Camera: AP/REUTERS/NASA/SKYPE/NATIONAL AUTONOMOUS UNIVERSITYProduced by: Arash Arabasadi 
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Taiwan, largely spared from the global coronavirus pandemic since it began last year, is grappling with a small but still uncontained outbreak that appeared last month. Since April 20, Taiwan’s Central Epidemic Command Center has confirmed infections of 10 pilots working for the Taiwan-based international carrier China Airlines and eight relatives of pilots. At the Novotel Taipei Taoyuan International Airport hotel, which is next to the island’s chief international airport, four employees, three of their family members and a hotel contractor have been diagnosed since April 29. On Tuesday, the command center reported two new COVID-19 cases, both airline employees. Authorities expect it will take another week or two to determine how wide the outbreak has spread. Health Minister Chen Shih-chung told a news conference Sunday the cluster does not qualify yet as a “community outbreak” but cautioned people to follow guidance on avoiding infections. “Until May 17 we will be in a period of high-level alert, so please everyone cooperate,” Chen told a Tuesday news conference. Command center officials have disclosed the movements of people who were recently infected so anyone who might have crossed paths can be tested for the virus. Potential infection spots include buses, convenience stores and restaurants in northern Taiwan including the capital Taipei, Centers for Disease Control deputy director Luo Yi-jun said. The command center says hundreds of contacts and potential contacts of the 24 patients confirmed through Monday had already been tested for infection. “Two days before these people showed symptoms, they were infectious, so this outbreak poses a very big challenge to the whole community,” said Chiu Cheng-hsun, vice superintendent at Linkou Chang Gung Hospital’s pediatric respiratory department. “Right now, there’s an extremely high risk, an extremely high chance, of a community [caseload].” Any more COVID-19 cases pegged to the airline, or the hotel should show up within the month, Chiu said. A wider outbreak would be Taiwan’s first runaway caseload since COVID-19 began gripping the world in early 2020. FILE – People wearing masks to protect against the coronavirus shop ahead of the Lunar New Year holiday, in Taipei, Taiwan, Feb. 9, 2021.Most people in Taiwan, population 24 million, are keeping their hands clean, wearing masks and disinfecting their surroundings, health professionals in Taiwan say. But they show few signs of changing their lifestyles otherwise. “I think the general Taiwanese public at this moment probably doesn’t believe Taiwan overall is so dangerous or so dire, and they’re not on such high alert, because Taiwan was a good student over the past last year, like it performed well,” said Wu Chia-yi, associate professor in the National Taiwan University College of Medicine’s nursing faculty. But she said some people feel “depressed” or “anxious,” especially if in a hospital and exposed to patients’ blood. People around Taiwan should step up disease prevention habits, such as mask wearing and hand washing, that might have slacked before the recent outbreak, Chiu said. The command center said last week it is exploring whether pilots of foreign-registered airlines set off the Novotel cluster. “Novotel teams are fully cooperating and following protocols and measurements as advised by the local authorities,” Novotel said in a statement. “Meanwhile, our focus is to closely monitor the progress of our staff members and guests who are currently under quarantine. The safety and wellbeing of our staff and guests are our absolute priority.” China Airlines has not answered requests for comment.Taiwan’s success in warding off COVID-19 has allowed people to keep working and going out as usual. The government controlled the virus spread in early 2020 through inspections of inbound aircraft, strict quarantine rules and rigorous contact tracing. Taiwan has logged a cumulative 1,153 cases with 12 deaths. The most recent localized outbreak occurred in December when an infected Eva Airways pilot sparked cluster of four people. Those cases prompted a wave of event cancellations and new restrictions on inbound pilots. Almost all other cases since the start of the pandemic are Taiwan residents returning from overseas. On Tuesday, the command center said it would step up disease controls by restricting bedside visits to hospital patients. Hospitals are tightening their own precautions, particularly in emergency rooms. 
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Turkey was recently heralded as one of the most successful nations in containing the spread of COVID 19, prompting the government to ease controls. But a surge in infections coupled with vaccine shortages has forced a U-turn, with the country now under its most severe lockdown, as Dorian Jones reports for VOA from Istanbul.
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As India reels from a second wave of COVID-19 infections that is devastating major cities, stockpiles are falling short of surging demand in the country, health experts warn. The country’s mass immunization bid to expand its vaccination drive to all adults is posing to be a herculean task, they say. India opened vaccinations to those who are 18 years of age and older this month. Although it is the world’s largest vaccine manufacturer, the approximately 70 million shots for COVID-19 being produced per month cannot address the massive needs of the world’s second most populous country, health experts say. K. Srinath Reddy is the president of the Public Health Foundation of India, a health research and policy development organization based in New Delhi. He said the challenge to meet demands includes groups considered “new entrants,” people between the ages of 18 to 44 years old.  “We are talking about 595 million people. So, we are talking of 1.2 billion doses,” he told VOA. “It’s a huge task and our vaccine stocks currently do not measure up anywhere near that.” Several states have said they cannot expand the drive because they are already struggling to inoculate older people with higher levels of risk. FILE – Relatives carry the body of a person who died of COVID-19 as multiple pyres of other COVID-19 victims burn at a crematorium in New Delhi, India.Quest for appointments
In cities like New Delhi and Mumbai, where the shots are being given to younger people, tens of thousands have been scrambling online to book limited slots on a government app for immunization since they became eligible on May 1. Only some have been successful. “We got a slot but then the booking was cancelled,” Piyush Kumar, a New Delhi resident who got vaccinated on the weekend said. “But we persevered and kept on trying to refresh the page and suddenly some slots [opened] at a hospital about 45 kilometers away. We rushed there.” India faces major challenges — Mumbai has an estimated five million people in the 18-44 age group but is only giving 2,500 shots per day due to limited stocks. Vaccinations for older people were suspended for days last week. Critics are blaming authorities for a sluggish rollout of what was ambitiously billed as the world’s largest vaccination program when it began in January with a target of reaching 300 million people by August.  Since then, about 2% of the population has been fully inoculated while about 10% has received one dose. As a result, much of the country was unprotected when it was hit by a ferocious second wave that hit seven million people in April alone — the country’s count is about 20 million cases.  A woman argues with a doctor as she is turned back following shortage of COVID-19 vaccine at a vaccination center in Mumbai, India, Monday, May 3, 2021. (AP Photo/Rafiq Maqbool)Stockpile failure
Experts say India failed to stockpile enough vaccines or invest early enough in boosting production facilities as it prematurely declared victory against the pandemic during a lull in infections earlier in the year. The government also sent 65 million doses to other countries as part of a “vaccine diplomacy” push. “I think it was factored in their minds that we will not have to deal with a second wave and therefore we could have a measured, steady graduated vaccination program which can flow in steps,” Reddy told VOA. “That is why we even felt we had the luxury of sending vaccines abroad to about 80 countries.”  The vaccine powerhouse was relying on domestically produced vaccines being made by two Indian companies — the Serum Institute of India that is making the Oxford/AstraZeneca shots and a domestically developed vaccine by Bharat Biotech. The government suspended exports and extended loans last month to build up infrastructure in the two companies as demand began exceeding supply. It has also stepped-up efforts to get vaccines from overseas. The first consignment of Sputnik V vaccines arrived from Russia this week and the vaccine will also be produced with local partners, but those doses could take months to reach the market. The government has said it will also grant emergency approval for vaccines approved in the United States, Britain, Europe or Japan.  Experts say the government needed a detailed plan on how it will secure the vaccines. “There was a shortage even when the drive did not open up to all adults,” points out public policy and health expert Chandrakant Lahariya. “Now the target beneficiaries have increased three-fold while the vaccine supply, which was already short, has remained the same. So, you can imagine how big the gap is. Even in months this may not be solved unless some additional approaches and strategies are followed.” Miscalculation
Adar Poonawalla, head of the Serum Institute of India, said this week that the shortages will continue through July when production is expected to increase. In an interview with the London-based Financial Times newspaper, he said he had not boosted capacity earlier because “there were no orders, we did not think we needed to make more than 1 billion doses a year.”  Now fear overhangs cities like New Delhi where the ongoing battle for hospital beds, drugs, and medical oxygen by tens of thousands shows no signs of abating.  Even hospitals have been scrambling for oxygen stocks and patients have died in hospitals that briefly ran out of oxygen. Social media is filled with desperate pleas for help. “I deleted social media apps for about a week in the middle because I just could not take it,” Kumar said. “But I had to get back because a lot of people are seeking help on that platform, and I need to be available. The times are very anxious.”   
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India has opened its immunization drive to all adults as it reels under a catastrophic second wave of the novel coronavirus pandemic. But a shortage of vaccines in the country often called a vaccine powerhouse means inoculating a significant part of the 1.4 billion population is still a distant goal. Anjana Pasricha has a report. 
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