Demand rises for vaccines at offices, residential complexes

There has been a spurt in demand for doorstep vaccinations with housing societies and corporate offices lining up at private hospitals with requests to hold inoculation camps.

Hospitals flooded with these inquiries — which have been spurred by the desire to avoid hospitals during the Covid-19 pandemic and the difficulties faced in booking online appointments — are taking on limited requests because of irregular supplies of vaccine doses.

Mumbai-based Hinduja Hospital said it has been approached by 100 corporate houses and housing societies. “We already have a demand for at least 250,000 doses of Covid19 vaccine. Now we are in the process of procuring stocks,” said Joy Chakraborty, chief operating officer of Hinduja Hospitals.

Vaccine supplies have improved, Chakraborty added, but are still not regular. “We are not getting vaccines at fixed intervals, like weekly or fortnightly basis,” he added.

Organising doorstep vaccination involves elaborate processes. Once the hospital receives a request, it asks the entities to make sure they have all the facilities available and are also asked to share a video of the premises. Based on this information, details are submitted to the governments to get their permission to set up a vaccination site.

A team arrives in the morning to set up the centre along with data verifiers, doctors, and one ambulance. For this service, hospitals charge an administrative cost per vaccine to the societies to cover the cost of equipment and personnel, apart from the charge for the vaccine dose.

There are other formalities too. For instance, in Mumbai, civic body officials from the respective ward office visit the site and a specific site or company or housing society code is generated.

“Lot of people have apprehensions about coming to the hospital for their jab. We are taking it up on a first come first serve basis,” a senior doctor with a Delhi-based private hospital group said. On an average, about 200-250 people are given the shot at one site in a day by this hospital, which has so far held more than two dozen such camps. At times repeat sessions are also scheduled. These sessions are organised to cover those in the 45plus age group as well as 18-44 age bracket.

“We book these sessions based on the future visibility of stocks,” the senior doctor said.

The hospital charges the same amount per dose as it does in its hospitals — ~850 per dose for Covishield and ~1,250 for Covaxin. “We are not buying from the government but from the manufacturer directly. Our costs are different,” the doctor added.

In cases where hospitals receive requests from smaller residential associations they are considering merging them and covering the bigger groups first.

Medica Hospital in Kolkata is looking to do 20,000 vaccinations a day and cover 300,000 doses a month, after having conducted community vaccination for Tollygunge Club employees, housing societies, some bank employees, and at the Kolkata airport.

The hospital charges ~850 per dose for Covishield. “We are charging ~100-200 as service charge. When we do vaccination drives in plush housing societies, we instead ask the rich and privileged to donate one vaccine for the poor. That we give to the underprivileged like rickshaw pullers, shopkeepers etc, who are finding it difficult to afford the vaccine from private sector providers,” said Alok Roy, chairman, Medica Group.

Medica is trying to create an inventory of 600,000 doses and expects equal demand between hospital walk-ins and doorstep vaccinations.