The central government will soon replace the age-old DPT (diphtheria, pertussis and tetanus) vaccine with a single shot pentavalent vaccine in the national immunisation programme.
The new vaccine will offer additional protection from Hepatitis B and Hib (influenza) infections and open up a Rs 1,500-crore business opportunity for pentavalent vaccine makers like Panacea Biotec and Shanta Biotech.
Speaking at a recent industry conference held here, Union Health Secretary Naresh Dayal said the government intends to introduce pentavalent vaccine in the immunisation programme from early 2009.
Dayal said as many as 114 countries have already introduced pentavalent vaccines under their immunisation programmes, adding that Indian companies were among the leading suppliers of these vaccines. The World Health Organization has approved pentavalent vaccines manufactured by Panacea, Shanta, Novartis and Glaxosmikthline for supplies to the United Nations vaccination programmes.
Rajesh Jain, joint managing director, Panacea, said: “India has 25 million births in a year. If you are aiming at 100 per cent immunisation..., the size of the government procurement could be a maximum of 100 million doses. With each dose costing between $3 and $4, this could be a $ 400-million opportunity.”
Panacea had recently bagged a Rs 143-crore order from the United Nations Children’s Fund (UNICEF) to supply it pentavalent vaccines for the next two years.
Meanwhile, the move will dampen the hopes of three public sector vaccine companies — Central Research Institute (CRI), Kasauli; Pasteur Institute of India, Coonoor; and Haffkine Bio-Pharmaceuticals, Mumbai — to resume DPT vaccine supplies to the national immunisation programme.
The CRI and Pasteur Institute were asked to stop vaccine production recently after they failed to adhere to manufacturing practices norms prescribed by the WHO. Following pressure from the Left parties, who were till recently supporting the UPA government, the health ministry had announced plans to revive these units. However, the policy shift from DPT to pentavalent vaccines will create further problems for these firms.
The move has also faced criticism from various quarters. Jacob Puliyel, a paediatrician at St Stephens Hospital, Delhi, questioned the motives of the government to “introduce extremely costly pentavalent vaccines”, even as the government has failed to immunise all new borns with the inexpensive DPT vaccine.
“The national immunisation programme is not reaching more than half of our population. While it is the government’s prerogative to spend $1 million or $1 billion on immunisation, the focus on expensive vaccines will increase budgetary constraints and put further pressure on making the vaccines available to all,” Puliyel added.
Currently, six diseases — polio, tuberculosis, diphtheria, pertussis (whopping cough), tetanus and measles — are targeted under the immunisation programme. These vaccines are made available free of cost through government agencies and hospitals.
