BMC claims to receive bids for supply of Pfizer Covid vaccine, company denies

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Brihanmumbai Municipal Corporation (BMC) Commissioner Iqbal Singh Chahal has claimed that the civic body has received a bid for the supply of Pfizer Covid vaccine in response to its COVID-19 vaccine procurement tender, prompting the American pharmaceutical major to issue a clarification that it has made no such bid.

The pharmaceutical company in its clarification stated that neither Pfizer nor any of its affiliates globally, including in India, have authorised anyone to import/market/distribute the Pfizer-BioNTech COVID-19 vaccine.

"As stated earlier, during this pandemic phase, across the world, Pfizer is supplying its COVID-19 vaccine only to central governments and supra-national organizations for deployment in national immunization programs. Neither Pfizer Inc nor any of its affiliates globally, including in India, have authorized anyone to import/market/distribute the Pfizer-BioNTech COVID 19 vaccine. We continue to have ongoing discussions with the Government of India towards making our vaccine available for use nationally," a Pfizer spokesperson said.

Earlier, BMC Commissioner Iqbal Singh had announced that Mumbai received eight bids so far including one from Pfizer and seven from Sputnik.

"In response to MCGM's Global Expression of Interest for procurement of 1 crore vaccine doses, I wish to inform that 8 bids have been received till date. One bid is for Pfizer/Astra Zeneca and remaining 7 bids are for Sputnik," Singh said.

"The time period has been extended by one week to enable the various bidders to submit complete set of documents in support of the bids as prescribed under MCGM's Global Expression of Interest. Any additional bid shall also be entertained," he added. 

The Municipal Corporation of Greater Mumbai (MCGM) had on May 12 floated global tenders to procure foreign vaccines. The deadline ended on Tuesday.

(With ANI Inputs)

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