India began the year 2021 by kick-starting a vaccination drive after approving the emergency use of two coronavirus vaccines, namely Covishield developed by Serum Institute of India, and Covaxin, developed by Bharat Bioteck.
Beginning with healthcare and frontline workers, the drive gave priority to people above 50 years and those with comorbidities in the second stage. It was slowly extended to everyone above the age of 18 years. The country made headlines in October for administering more than a billion Covid jabs in 278 days and India’s vaccination drive was touted as the biggest in the world. As per government data by the end of 2021, India had vaccinated more than 50% of the adult population with both doses of vaccine, and approximately 85% with atleast one dose. When 2021 drew to a close, India approved two new indegenously-developed vaccines-Corbeix and Covovax-and a contentious anti-viral drug, Molnupiravir, for emergency use. On December 26, it announced vaccines for teenagers aged between 15 and 18 years to be rolled out from January 3, 2022.
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