Cyrus Poonawala, the man behind more child vaccines than anyone in the world, was awarded the Padma Shree on Monday, giving drugmakers their first dose of unadulterated good news this year.For the chairman of the Serum Institute of India, which supplies the lowest priced vaccines to millions of children in 138 countries, the award couldn’t have come at a better—or worse—time.On January 1, India re-installed the product patent regime for pharmaceuticals, casting a shadow over the profitability of hundreds of ‘copycat’ drugmakers.But for the publicity-shy Serum Institute, which remains unlisted though drugmakers have cashed in on their investments, the award means business as usual—and perhaps, more faith in the future.‘‘I think the award is because of my efforts in taking vaccines made in India to the global map,’’ says Poonawala, who supplied two of every three children worldwide their anti-measles shots in 2004.He may be underestimating his own success: In supplying anti-measles drugs alone, the Serum Institute leads the output of all MNCs taken together. All vaccines accounted for, the institute is at least the fourth-largest supplier worldwide.This, of course, translates into millions of children protected from communicable diseases including measles, tuberculosis, mumps, Hepatitis-B and diphtheria around the world, using Indian technology.Says Poonawala, ‘‘All our technology is indigenous, but for initial imports from Yugoslavia during launch in the 1970s.’’ And, though already a major supplier to the WHO and UNICEF, Poonawala is looking out for more - including an AIDS vaccine in five or ten years. ‘‘We are working on many more vaccines, we are hunting for breakthroughs, though the largest supplies are likely to be for tuberculosis and whoopping cough vaccines,’’ says Poonawala.But there is a downside. Poonawala believes research on an AIDS vaccine is ‘‘not progressing as well as many would have thought before.’’ And here is another stumbling stone: Some vaccines will be affected by the product patent regime.‘‘Fortunately, most vaccines in use today are not covered by the patents regime. The newer vaccines may partly come under the regime, though generally they won’t,’’ says Poonawala, who has nevertheless petitioned the government to exclude certain kinds of vaccines.‘‘We are making a representation to the government, supported by the WHO, that the Patents Act should exclude vaccines that are in the public health,’’ he saysCurrently, the Serum Institute provides vaccines at prices far below multinational drug firms’. Its DPT dose, for instance, comes at Rs 2; Hepatitis-B for Rs 50 and Rabivax, against rabies, for under half what MNCs brands charge. The thing is, only the list of excluded drugs will tell which will cost less, and which won’t in the not-too-distant future.
