India is world's vaccine factory: What happens when it can't deliver

India stopped exporting Covid-19 vaccines in mid-April, leaving low-income and lower-middle-income countries in the lurch.

India reported that 4,529 people had died from Covid-19 on Tuesday alone. That’s the highest official daily death count for any country since the beginning of the pandemic, and the real toll is thought to be even higher. More than 25 million cases of infection have been recorded there to date.

Given the scale of the crisis, it’s imperative that the Indian government vaccinate its people and stave off future waves of infection. But this unequivocal need also spells dire consequences for other countries that rely on vaccines produced in India.

These spillover effects highlight a systemic problem in global