Hyderabad, October 27, 2020.

Amidst the buzz around an imminent COVID-19 vaccine to be available in near future, Hyderabad based Medihauxe Pharma Pvt. Ltd, critical care, life-saving super specialty drugs distribution company announced that it is fully geared up to handle, store and distribute Corona Vaccine in both Telugu states as and when the vaccine is made available.  

We have experience and expertise in handling temperature sensitive specialty medicine and Cold Chain Pharma Products,  their storage and handling declares, Girish Bhat and P. Manohar, MD and Director of Medihauxe Pharma.  Our facility is the state-of-the-art one and the warehouse infrastructure is one of the best in the country.  We equipped with the latest technology, coupled with time-tested systems, agile management to ensure world class service, they added.

The first-ever, temperature-sensitive medicine cooling facility, 2 to 8 degrees,  at distribution level has all the requisite infrastructure such as Cold Chain, Walk-in-Cold Rooms, Data Loggers, informed Girish Bhat, MD of 25 years old Medihauxe Pharma Pvt. Ltd, the distributor of over 3,000 super specialty products, most of which are life-saving and some are rare.

Medihauxe Pharma currently deals with medicine categories such as cancer; liver, lung, kidney and cardiac transplants. Its facilities are audited by international pharma majors. The currently the turnover of the company is Rs 180 crore and has 120 employees. Many private and government organizations have been visiting Medihauxe Pharma for a study tour to understand its facilities.   

The cool room temperature is maintained less than 20 degrees throughout the year. In case of temperature fluctuations, it is automatically alerts informed P Manohar Bhat, Director of the company. It has all these facilities in place as of 2016 as prescribed in SoPs of respective pharma majors. With uninterrupted power back up, temperature is monitored by a round the clock. Data Loggers are put in place to check the temperature three times a day. It has the distinction of running its operations without any breakdown in the last four years even for a single minute informs Girish.   

With so much of infrastructure already pre existing and running well, we are ready to accept the challenges and responsibility of Corona Vaccine distribution, says Girish Bhat.  

The whole world is look at pharma companies for the vaccine.  India is lookin at Hyderabad, as 4 out of 6 vaccine makers in the country are based here.  In the words of KT Ramarao, Telangana’s Minister, “Hyderabad is the Vaccine Captial of the World”.  He is confidence on first COVID vaccine rolling out from Hyderabad.  As we are nearing to the vaccine, companies and the government machinery is looking at Medihauxe Pharma for its delivery in Telugu states as we have proven track record, adds Girish Bhat.

If making Vaccine available is one challenge, then deliver it to masses is another big challenge. While speaking about Government's vaccine rollout plan Prime Minister Narendra Modi called for speedy access to COVID-19 vaccines, suggested vaccine delivery system on lines of conduct of elections. He stressed upon the importance of Cold Chain management.

According to Girish and Manohar, the scale of adult vaccination distribution is so vast that such a scale of distribution was not done before. Polio Vaccine aimed at kids was done over several years. Corona Vaccine is a different kind of a ball game.  Unlike Polio vaccine which can be administered by ASHA workers and others, Corona Vaccine is intramuscular injection. We need little more experienced health care workers such as nurses to administer it. 

It is supposed to be given either by nurses, doctors or Medical students(MBBS). Another challenge, as I understand is, people may most likely need two doses, not just one -- and that could cause real problem

says Girish Bhat. The double doses of vaccine with a gap of one month in between may  add more complexity to the distribution, he observed.  Besides that, he says,  it is the largest ever vaccination program in the history of entire mankind.

Another huge challenge will be availability of medical devices such as auto disposable syringes, needles required for the delivery of the vaccine. While demand is more,  the supply is not in commensuration with the demand as companies have been working with far fewer resources, shared Girish. 

Giving more details, Girish Bhat said, the SRS-CoV-2 vaccine, like any other vaccines, need to be kept in cold, fixed within a precise temperature range from the moment it leaves the manufacturer to the moment it’s administered. This is very hard, even some developed countries with strong supply chains find it difficult. But, in our case, we have been achieving uninterrupted temperature maintenance even in transit for the past so many years with proven track record.  

Lack of robust cold chain network to support the supply chain represents a significant gap in today’s pharma infrastructure. One third cold chain logistics providers do not have adequate capacity and temperature control systems to support today’s drug storage and handling requirements.  

Medihauxe distributes critical medicines of 140 companies. These big pharmaceutical companies lay down strict temperature controls uninterrupted between 2 to 8 degrees. It has the distinction of strictly adhering to their SoPs for many year.  

A vaccine’s journey can be risky with underdeveloped infrastructure. If there’s a break in the cold chain as a vaccine has to be taken to many places, it will lose its potency. And the entire purpose is defeated. 

During the past several months ever since the outbreak of the pandemic, Medihauxe Pharma has been in the forefront in supplying life-saving Corona Drugs such as TOCILIZUMAB(CIPLA), REMDESIVIR 100MG (CIPLA & DR REDDY'S), ITOLIZUMAB 25MG (BIOCON), CYTOSORBENTS (CYTOSORB. BIOCAN), FAVIPIRAVIR(GLENMARK) to all the major hospital in Hyderabad and Telangana. The Telangana Government Machinery, Health Minister, State and Union Health Ministry Officials, Drug Controller,  their authorities and all super specialty hospitals have been in constant touch with us . 

We need a smooth delivery of covid-19 vaccines to several crore population in both Telugu states Girish.  Medihauxe Pharma has offices and infrastructure in Hyderabad, Vijayawada and Vishakhapatnam.  Our deep freezing, cold chain management facilities are the best in the industry and pioneers in this area he says.  

Amid many hopes vaccine for the deadly infectious disease is likely to be ready by the end of this year or early next year. And when it comes, Medihauxe Pharma hopes to be a distribution and delivery partner.