SII fixes Covishield price at Rs 600 for private hospitals, Rs 400 for state governments

Serum Institute of India on Wednesday said it would sell the Covishield vaccine to state governments at Rs 400 per dose and to private hospitals at Rs 600 per dose.

SII CEO Adar Poonawalla, in a statement, urged all corporate and private individuals to access the vaccines through the state facilitated machinery and private health systems.

He said that after four to five months, the vaccines will be made available in retail and free trade.

The Pune-based vaccine-maker had offered vaccines to the Central government at a special rate of Rs 150 per dose when the vaccination drive began in January.

Read: Priyanka Gandhi calls Centre's Covid-19 vaccine strategy 'abject failure'

“For the next two months, we will address the limited capacity by scaling up the vaccine production,” Poonawalla said.

“Going ahead, 50% of our capacities will be served to the Government of India's vaccination programme, and the remaining 50% of the capacity will be for the state governments and private hospitals,” it said.

He said considering the global vaccine prices, SII was ensuring that its vaccines were affordable in comparison to any other vaccines in the world.

He said American vaccines cost Rs 1,500 per dose, while Russian and Chinese vaccines come at Rs 750 per dose.

On January 12, Poonawalla had said SII was offering Covishield to the Government of India at a special price of Rs 200 for the first 100 million doses and later, the company would sell the vaccine at Rs 1,000 per dose in private markets.

IMPORTANT ANNOUNCEMENT pic.twitter.com/bTsMs8AKth

— SerumInstituteIndia (@SerumInstIndia) April 21, 2021