Serum Institute fire: Adar Poonawalla explains why he tweeted, 'no lives lost'

Serum Institute of India CEO Adar Poonawalla said that he was deeply saddened by the loss of lives in the fire at the vaccine-maker's facility in Pune. Five people lost their lives in the fire that broke out at a building inside Terminal Gate 1 of the Serum Institute of India (SII) in Maharashtra's Pune on Thursday afternoon. The fire had broken out at a plant of the Serum Institute in Manjri area of Pune.

When the fire broke SII CEO Adar Poonawalla had taken to the twitter immediately and tweeted, "Thank you everyone for your concern and prayers. So far the most important thing is that there have been no lives lost or major injuries due to the fire, despite a few floors being destroyed."

However, later in the day news came that five charred bodies were recovered from the Serum Institute of India building where fire broke out on Thursday afternoon.

Adar Poonawalla then gave an explanation on his above tweet. Poonawalla said, "As soon as the first report of the fire department came that everything was safe, I tweeted. But later when investigation was done again, then the matter of deaths came up. After which I updated my tweet."

Poonawalla had tweeted later on Thursday, "We have just received some distressing updates; upon further investigation we have learnt that there has unfortunately been some loss of life at the incident. We are deeply saddened and offer our deepest condolences to the family members of the departed."

After the incident, on Thursday Cyrus Poonawalla, Chairman and MD, SII, announced that the vaccine manufacturing company will be offering compensation of Rs 25 lakh to each family, "in addition to mandated amount as per the norms."

The Serum Institute of India, the world's largest vaccine manufacturer, is involved in manufacturing COVID-19 vaccine Covishield that is developed by Oxford University and AstraZeneca.