H2- A top foreign ministry official announced that India would export eight million coronavirus vaccine jabs by the end of October after dropping its prohibition on shipping doses abroad.
Prime Minister Narendra Modi vowed to continue exports at a meeting of leaders from the so-called Quad in Washington as India, Japan, Australia, and the US try to counter expanding Chinese influence across the Asia-Pacific region.
On Saturday, foreign secretary Harsh Vardhan Shringla informed reporters that most of the eight million doses of the Johnson & Johnson single-shot vaccine would be transferred to Asia-Pacific countries.
"This would be ready by the end of October. This is an immediate delivery, from the Quad into the Indo-Pacific region," Shringla reported to reporters.
India is one of the world's most prominent vaccine producers and had vouched earlier this year to ship one billion Covid-19 jabs by December 2022.
But New Delhi paused exports in May after a destructive coronavirus wave devastated the country.
India lifted its vaccine export ban this week, with new Covid-19 infections and deaths reducing.
The country underwent weeks of vaccine shortages as a coronavirus wave killed at least 250,000 and infected millions of people between March and May. It has now served nearly 840 million vaccine doses. Almost half of the adult population has had at least one jab, with 16 per cent getting a second dose.
