Apollo Hospitals gears up to administer 1 million Covid-19 vaccines daily

According to the hospital chain, its cold chain network can deliver the vaccine in less than 30 mins and in maximum 48 hours across the country

Apollo Hospitals is geared up to administer a million Covid-19 vaccines daily and 300 million every year, which will make it the largest private sector to have such a distribution coverage in India, Shobana Kamineni, the group’s executive vice-chairperson, said. 

The group has invested Rs 200 crore over the years to set up cold chain and other infrastructure to reach vaccines across the country, she said.

Her estimate is 1.3 billion doses need to be given in India, of which 300 million can be given by Apollo alone. Nearly 10,000 Apollo employees will be stationed at Apollo centres to administer the vaccine.

Already 7,000 are trained, rest of the people are going through a certification programme. Kamineni said Apollo had spoken to several manufacturers, however, they have said capacities are full, so the initial stage will be only through the government, maybe for a year.

Eventually if the government allows the private sector to purchase the vaccine, Apollo will be ready to buy it, apart from distributing it. According to her pricing of the vaccine has not been fixed and will be controlled by the government.