Bharat Biotech to ramp up Covaxin production to additional 200 million doses per year

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New Delhi: Bharat Biotech, the company which manufactures COVID-19 vaccine Covaxin, has decided to ramp up its production to manufacture additional 200 million doses per year.

The COVID-19 vaccines will be produced at Chiron Behring Vaccines, Ankleshwar, Gujarat, a wholly-owned subsidiary of Bharat Biotech.

To this effect Bharat Biotech issued a statement saying: "The company plans to produce 200 million doses of Covaxin per annum in the GMP facilities that are already operational for the production of vaccines based on inactivated Vero Cell Platform Technology under stringent levels of GMP and biosafety. Product availability at Ankleshwar to commence from the fourth quarter of 2021."

The additional volume of Covaxin doses takes the manufactured volume up to 1 billion doses per annum. Product availability at Ankleshwar to commence from Q4 2021, it added.

"Adding Chiron Behring to this up of high containment BSL rated GMP facilities that are required to manufacture Covaxin and effectively takes the volume upto-one billion doses per annum with its own established campuses specialised for manufacturing inactivated viral vaccines under the highest levels of biosafety," the statement read.

The company said that it has already deployed multiple production lines at its Hyderabad and Bengaluru campuses as well.