IndRa: Cost of vaccinating India’s population above 18 years 0.36% of GDP

The India Ratings and Research (Ind-Ra) recently said the estimated cost to vaccinate all the Indians of age 18 years will be Rs 67,193 crores. This is 0.36% of the GDP of the country.

Key Findings

The GoI recently announced the Liberalised and Accelerated Phase 3 strategy of COVID-19 vaccine. According to the new strategy, all the persons above 18 years of age are eligible to get COVID-19 vaccine. With this, the total size of population eligible for vaccination is 84.19 crores. The population of India is 133.26 crores. The India Ratings and Research says that it will cost Rs 67,193 to vaccinate 84.19 crores of people. The Union Government will incur Rs 20,870 crores of the cost and the state government shall incur Rs 46,323 crores.

Amount spent so far

The Ind-Ra also states that the Union Government has already spent Rs 5,090 crores in procuring 21.4 crores of vaccines from Bharat Biotech and Serum Institute of India. COVAXIN was procured from Bharat Biotech and COVISHIELD From Serum Institute of India.

Assuming that the wastage to be 5%, the cost of procurement is to come to Rs 62,103 crores.

How can the procurement cost be split between state and the central governments?

If the cost of procurement of vaccines are split between the central and state governments, the amount to be spent by the Union Government on the vaccination will be 0.12% of GDP and the amount to be spent by the State Governments will be 0.24% of GDP.

The maximum impact is likely to be on Bihar. Bihar will have to spend 0.6% of its State Gross Domestic Product (SGDP), Uttar Pradesh will have to spend 0.47% of its SGDP, 0.37% by Jharkhand, 0.36% by Manipur, 0.35% by Assam, Odisha and Madhya Pradesh will have to spend 0.30% of their SGDP.

Month: Current Affairs - April, 2021