From factory to front line, all roads lead to Covid-19 vaccine roll-out

According to sources, a contract may be signed between the government and the vaccine makers on Monday, and the first batch of vaccinations will be done using Serum Institute's (SII's) Covishield

As the countdown has begun for V-day, transport and infrastructure machineries are coming together to ensure smooth roll-out, while vaccine majors step up security. According to sources, a contract may be signed between the government and the vaccine makers on Monday, and the first batch of vaccinations will be done using Serum Institute of India’s (SII’s) Covishield.

Armed police personnel stationed at the Hadapsar plant of SII in Pune sum up the moment. The local police are ready to escort the shipment of Covishield vials from the plant to Pune airport or up to the boundaries of districts where the vaccine is travelling by road, said people in the know.

Some 10 km away from the SII plant, at Pune airport, the 24x7 command centre set up by the Airports Authority of India (AAI) is the hub of all action ahead of the mega vaccination drive starting January 16. The centre is monitoring the movement of the Covid-19 vaccine, which will be distributed by air to 36 states and UTs.

According to aviation sources, the AstraZeneca-Oxford vaccine manufactured by SII will be packed in boxes weighing 32 kilos.  Each box would have around 12,000 doses and gel packs for refrigeration.

Over 20 million doses of vaccines from SII are expected to be flown in the initial phase. This will involve transporting around 1,700 such boxes.

With only limited doses to be made available initially, the consignments will be carried in passenger aircraft as belly cargo since it would be more cost-effective. Later in February, as output increases and SII starts exporting, freighter jets will be deployed.  Initially, it was expected that the Indian Air Force’s (IAF’s) C-17 Globemaster will be used for moving the vaccine.

Airports, said sources, are readying to transport the first tranche of vaccine within the next two days.

Power distribution companies (discoms) are on alert as well to ensure uninterrupted supply to cold chain points. Reefer trucks are waiting for the word go and the medical fraternity, in front of the line, is now counting days to get the much-awaited jab.

Dr Bishnu Panigrahi, group head, medical strategy and operations, Fortis Healthcare, who has recovered from Covid is looking forward to the jab.

“All our hospital workers have been enrolled... There was fear in the minds of health workers until now. Now they can attend to patients without worrying about catching Covid.”

While Pune airport will see bulk of the movement, vaccines will also be trucked to Mumbai and flown to different locations within the country. A task force has been created at Mumbai airport comprising all stakeholders for speedy handling.

“We have set up a command centre with officials on duty to efficiently handle the carriage of vaccines once they arrive at the airport. Such centres have been set up at major airports like Chennai and Kolkata from where the vaccines will be distributed across the country,” said Keku Bomi Gazder, chief executive officer, AAI Cargo Logistics and Allied Services Company, which will be the nodal body for managing air transportation of the vaccines.

Technology will play a critical role in the vaccination drive. Ram Sewak Sharma, the recently appointed chairman of the empowered group on technology and data management to combat Covid, has given an overall view of the CoWIN software — the backbone of the last-mile vaccination to states. He has said that capturing vaccination data in real time is of critical importance and non-negotiable. “The posting of the data on the portal may be online or offline in view of connectivity issues being highlighted by a few states.”

The vaccines will be transported to four large depots, which are the primary vaccine storage centres in Karnal, Mumbai, Chennai, and Kolkata. From these depots, the vaccine will travel in refrigerated vans to 37 state vaccine stores.

Kolkata has prepared 20 docking stations for the refrigerated trucks, which will wait for vaccines to arrive. Once the vaccine gets cleared by Customs authorities, the boxes will be directly loaded onto the trucks from the aircraft. “This is one of the special instances where trucks will be allowed near the aircraft,” said Kaushik Bhattacharya, director of Kolkata airport.

While Pune airport, the city where SII is located, has some infrastructure constraints, airport Director Kuldip Singh said there was enough infrastructure available to handle the transportation. Pune airport, which is a civil enclave and controlled and owned by the IAF, is undergoing runway recarpeting. It is closed from 8 pm to 8 am, severely restricting the hours of operations and shipping of cargo.

“We have enough infrastructure available to transport vaccines. Every day, we operate 37 flights to 15 destinations around the country. We handle 150 tonnes of cargo daily. We are prepared and waiting for SII to ship their first transport,” said Singh.

The crucial need to maintain the 2-8 degrees Celsius temperature as the antidote travels the length and breadth of the country is top priority for power discoms, which have to ensure uninterrupted power supply at all cold chain depots. Senior officials of the power ministry said power discoms across the country were “fully prepared” to ensure steady electricity supply to vaccine storage units and vaccination points.

Discoms haven’t reported any glitch, an official said. “We will issue detailed directions by next week. Overall power supply is in surplus, so is coal availability. Electricity supply will be seamless during the vaccine transport and vaccination drive.”

Kool-Ex Cold Chain, with its 400 reefer trucks, is expecting a go-ahead from SII on Monday to despatch its fleet. “There are 40-50 government depots across India and the vaccine will be despatched from pharmaceutical companies to these depots in the first leg. The despatch will begin pan-Indian right away,” said Rahul Agarwal, managing director at Kool-Ex Cold Chain.

Inputs from Aditi Divekar