India is one of the largest syringe makers in the world when it comes to 0.5 ml auto-disable syringes for intramuscular vaccination. With the current race towards procuring and distributing a Covid-19 vaccine, syringe manufacturers in the country are ramping up their capacities further by over 30% to meet the expected rise in global demand.
ISCON, Becton Dickinson, and Hindustan Syringes and Medical Device (HMD) are the three major Indian medical device companies which manufacture the 0.5 ml auto-disable syringes which would be required to administer a Covid-19 vaccine. The companies together have planned to expand their capacities to manufacture 1.4 billion pieces per annum by June 2021 next year.
“We are planning to ramp up our capacity to a billion 0.5 ml AD syringes and offer 50% to the Government of India and 50% as exports, which amounts to 200-250 million by June 2021 and another 250 million from June to December 2021,” said Rajiv Nath, Managing Director of Hindustan Syringes and Medical Devices Ltd.
“We have 70 million AD syringes in stock against our orders of standard immunisation campaign and can offer 100 million to Government of India by end of 2020, if needed,” he added.