The removal of Covishield from the COVID-19 Vaccination Passport with the EU, according to the Serum Institute of India, will harm students and business travellers, as well as destabilise the Indian and worldwide economies.
The Serum Institute of India (SII) has asked the government to include the Covishield in the EU COVID-19 Vaccination Passport with the European Union and other the countries, claiming that failure to do so may impact on the studies of students and business travellers, as well as it may disrupt the Indian and global economies. The European Medicines Agency (EMA) has authorized and listed just four vaccines: Pfizer/Comirnaty, BioNTech’s Moderna, AstraZeneca-Vaxzervria, Oxford’s and Johnson & Johnson’s Janssen (EMA) yet and only those people will be allowed to enter Europe and will be allowed to travel within EU during the pandemic with vaccination passport who got their vaccination done from the four vaccines listed by European Medicines Agency.
A source quoted that Adar C Poonawalla, CEO of Serum Institute of India, as having communicated in a letter to External Affairs Minister S Jaishankar that, “India has a large population. However, not including Covishield in the EU COVID-19 Vaccination Passport will not allow Covishield vaccinated people to travel to European countries and this will affect students, business travellers back and forth, and cause severe disruptions to our economy and to the global economy.”
Sources told that referring to Poonawalla’s letter, the director of government and regulatory affairs at SII, Prakash Kumar Singh, has also sought Jaishankar’s intervention at the highest level.