Man who risked his life for Covishield trials now forced to beg Adar Poonawalla, PM to help vaccinate family

When Santosh More (50), a CSR Consultant in Pune, decided last year in August to volunteer to receive the Covishield vaccine, his wife and daughters begged him to desist. But More, a long distance runner, overcame their inhibitions and became one of the first 10 Indians to receive the shot during the Phase II trial. “I wanted to contribute to science,” he explains.

Almost a year later, More is frustrated at his failure to get his wife and eldest daughter vaccinated. His domestic help and her husband too have not received the jabs despite multiple efforts.

“I have been trying desperately for last two months but no slots are available on CoWIN. Only influential people are managing to get the vaccines, while people like us are left in the lurch despite tall promises by Modi government. I have been begging Serum Institute of India for help but have failed to get any response,” he says. His tweets to the PMO and Serum Institute chief Adar Poonawalla have gone unanswered. How is it that ordinary folks like us are not getting the vaccine but the influential seem to be facing no issues, he asks bitterly.

He and five of his friends received the first dose of the vaccine in August and the second in September after they signed the formal agreement that mentioned ICMR and SII India as the protocol/execution agency of the project.

They had volunteered at a time when no one was ready to take the risk of being injected with a drug whose effects and side-effects were completely unknown. Earlier in 2021 this year, when trials commenced for Zydus Cadila’s ZyCoV-D vaccine for children aged between 12 to 17 years, More encouraged his daughter Radha to volunteer for the trial and she received the vaccine in April. She too is among the first in the country to volunteer for a new Covid vaccine under trial and received three shots of the vaccine.

Not many parents were willing to have their children treated as ‘guinea pigs’ and it was hard to persuade them to give their consent, he recalls.

“The big pharma companies have no respect for our sacrifices. They just want to use us to propagate their own business at the risk of our lives,” More now feels.

“It is such a shame that despite my selfless contribution to the nation, I have to beg for jabs for my wife and daughter,” More added.