Covaxin priced at Rs.600 a dose for States, Rs.150 for the Centre, and Rs.1,200 for private hospitals

Krishna Ella, Chairman and Managing Director of Bharat Biotech.

Hyderabad-based Bharat Biotech, which manufacturers Covaxin, one of the two vaccines now available in India against COVID-19, has fixed the price of the vaccine at Rs.600 a dose for State governments and Rs.1,200 a dose for private hospitals. This is more expensive than the Serum Institute of India (SII)’s Covishield, which is priced at Rs.400 a dose for State governments and Rs.600 a dose for private hospitals. Bharat Biotech has indicated a price band between $15 and 20 as the cost of Covaxin in export markets.

Announcing the dual prices of Covaxin, Krishna M, Ella, Bharat Biotech’s chairman and managing director, said recovering costs was essential in the “journey of innovation towards other vaccines such as intranasal COVID-19, chikungunya, zika, cholera and others”. He said the company was supplying the vaccine to the Government of India at Rs.150 a dose. The pricing for Covaxin has come at a time when the opposition has questioned the need for differential pricing of the Covishield vaccine for the Centre and the States.

Andhra Pradesh, starting May 1, will seek to vaccinate 2,04,70,364 people in the 18 to 45 age group across the State. It has placed orders for 4.08 crore doses of Covaxin and Covishield. The exercise is expected to cost the government Rs.1,600 crore. Telangana expects its vaccination programme to cost the exchequer more than Rs.2,500 crore.