India will now authorise vaccines approved by the US, UK, EU, Japan or WHO.
So in April 2021, Indian citizens will finally be allowed to get the Pfizer & moderna vaccines, which has been *illegal* till now. Pfizer actually withdrew its application for authorisation months ago after being asked to jump through hoops by the Indian government for no good reason.
The last year should make us much more sceptical of these regulatory bodies. India's is a stupidly extreme case, but every country's regulator has required a complex submission and evaluation procedure for these vaccines despite the burning pandemic and very strong evidence from other places. There's no good reason for the EU and US health regulators (for example) to not trust each other's judgement of the data. And there's even less reason for Indian regulators to think that their scrutiny is more rigorous and trustworthy.
So in April 2021, Indian citizens will finally be allowed to get the Pfizer & moderna vaccines, which has been *illegal* till now. Pfizer actually withdrew its application for authorisation months ago after being asked to jump through hoops by the Indian government for no good reason.
The last year should make us much more sceptical of these regulatory bodies. India's is a stupidly extreme case, but every country's regulator has required a complex submission and evaluation procedure for these vaccines despite the burning pandemic and very strong evidence from other places. There's no good reason for the EU and US health regulators (for example) to not trust each other's judgement of the data. And there's even less reason for Indian regulators to think that their scrutiny is more rigorous and trustworthy.
