Bill Gates applauds India for affordable vaccines

Lalit K Jha: Washington: Billionaire philanthropist and Microsoft co-founder Bill Gates has praised India for its vaccine-manufacturing prowess and applauded the efforts of the country's manufacturers for supplying affordable vaccines across the world.

Addressing a virtual roundtable on India-US Health Partnership organised by the Indian embassy on Tuesday, Gates noted that over the last year, India has delivered over 150 million doses of Covid-19 vaccines to nearly 100 countries. "At the same time, thanks to Indian vaccine manufacturers, almost every country in the world now is offering vaccines to protect children from diseases such Pneumonia and Rotavirus, which have been leading causes of child's deaths for decades," Gates said.

The roundtable was organised to bring together key stakeholders in India and US for leveraging the bilateral partnership to make affordable vaccines available to the world. "While this pandemic isn't yet over, we have begun to look beyond the emergency response. This means not only controlling Covid but also being ready to stop future outbreaks before they become pandemics and continuing to fight all the infectious diseases," he explained.

In his remarks, Gates said that Prime Minister Narendra Modi has talked about deepening India's commitment to global health by continuing to harness the country's science and technology talent to advance scientific discovery and the creation of new products. "This is a shared ambition and partnerships are central to making it a reality," he said. Gates said that the three vaccines - Covaxin, Corbavex and Covishield - were the products of partnerships that bridge sectors as well as borders.