Lol keep up with the times , India is the world's largest vaccine producer and a lot of it is via indigenous pharma companies like Sun Pharma (3rd biggest in the world by production) and Cipla etc , There's a ton of domestic R&D involved and they make most of their profits with US,UK sales .and there is massive untapped growth potential both domestically and in SE Asia etc .
If the "west" decides to pull back its manufacturing to home to their own countries their production prices will rocket , profit margins will shrink and drug prices will rise and they'll find it harder to compete with Indian,Chinese brands . So I doubt the likes of GSK,Novartis etc would simply go along with that decision
As far as covid vaccine goes then there too we're not waiting hand on foot for AstraZeneca's IP . We have one homemade already in mass production (Covaxin by Bharat Biotech ) which will hit 700 million doses by end of year .
Then there's the other vaccines currently under trial and development here
- ZyCov-Di, being developed by Ahmedabad-based Zydus-Cadila
- A vaccine being developed by Hyderabad-based Biological E, the first Indian private vaccine-making company, in collaboration with US-based Dynavax and Baylor College of Medicine
- HGCO19, India's first mRNA vaccine made by Pune-based Genova in collaboration with Seattle-based HDT Biotech Corporation, using bits of genetic code to cause an immune response
- A nasal vaccine by Bharat BioTech
- The Sputnik V vaccine candidate developed by Dr Reddy's Lab and Gamaleya National Centre in Russia
- A second vaccine being developed by Serum Institute of India and American vaccine development company Novavax
So no , We're not dependent on any one company or country , If AstraZeneca or Bojo decides he wants to take 6 months setting up a factory in the UK then be our guest ....We have plenty of other things going on .
This is nothing new , When the American and European brands were charging 10,,000-15,000 $ per shot for the HIV cocktail at the height of the African AIDS epidemic in the 1990's it was Cipla who stepped up ,came up with their own cocktail and sold it to poor countries and Doctors without Borders for as little as 300$