Vaccine Maitri: India to begin export of surplus vaccines, donations from next month

India's Union Health Minister Mansukh Mandaviya announced on Monday that it will soon resume the export of vaccines to other countries from next month itself. This service will resume after India stopped the export in April this year to focus on vaccinating its own citizens. 

This announcement has come just a day before Prime Minister Narendra Modi's visit to the US where the issue of vaccine export was likely going to be raised by US President, Joe Biden. 

Addressing the media, Mandaviya said that this is an effort to restart the 'Vaccine Maitri' programme to meet the country's Covax global pool. However, he stressed that vaccinating the citizens of India is a top priority. 

He further added that the government is expecting to receive over thirty crore doses of COVID-19 vaccines in October and over a hundred crore doses in the next three months. Currently, only 61 per cent of the adult population has been vaccinated and the government aims to innoculate at least 94.4 crore adults by December this year. 

Vaccines are going to be a part of the discussion at a summit of the leaders of the Quad countries - the United States, India, Japan and Australia.