Pune-based Serum Institute of India will go for countrywide launch of its anti-Rabies vaccine by October, according to senior company officials. The launch is expected to cover states in South, North, East and West.

Kerala is the only state where the company had launched the vaccine a year ago. This launch was intended to check the quality of its vaccine in preparation for the countrywide launch. Moreover, the largest demand for rabies vaccine came from Kerala.

During its Kerala launch the institute's capacity stood at 200,000 doses. "Kerala launch has been highly successful. We have substantially increased our capacity since then," said Masud Ahmed, marketing director, Serum Institute of India. It is learnt that by October 2004, Serum will be increasing its capacity to 40 lakh doses. Serum's vaccine, developed on human diploid cells, is intra-muscular and has a dosage level of five.

"The vaccine is competitively priced at about Rs 300 per dose. In future we have plans to export the vaccine," added Ahmed.

Rabies, also known as hydrophobia, is an acute and highly fatal viral disease of the central nervous system. It is communicated to humans through rabid animals. Nearly 75,000 deaths are reported globally due to rabies each year with 35,000 deaths reported from India alone.

Aventis Pharma, Zydus Cadila, and Hyderabad-based Human Biologicals Institute are the major companies manufacturing modern anti-rabies vaccine in the country. The total size of the market is Rs 180 crore of which about 65 per cent is controlled by Aventis.

In India the anti-Rabies vaccine brands are priced at around Rs 300. The company sources maintain that field trials have established that Serum's is superior to the available vaccines. The vaccines are being produced at a new manufacturing facility at Hadapsar, Pune.