Modi reviews inoculation drive, highlights wastage of vaccines

OFFICIALS APPRISE PM MODI ABOUT THE EFFORTS UNDERTAKEN TO HELP VARIOUS MANUFACTURERS RAMP UP VACCINE PRODUCTION

NEW DELHI: Prime Minister Narendra Modi chaired a highlevel meeting to review the country’s vaccination drive on Friday, and instructed officials to take measures to bring down vaccine wastage, which, he noted, was still high. The meeting was attended by top leaders including defence minister Rajnath Singh, home minister Amit Shah, and finance minister Nirmala Sitharaman, among others.

“PM was briefed about the current availability of vaccines and the roadmap for ramping it up. He was also apprised about the efforts undertaken to help various vaccine manufacturers ramp up production of vaccines. Government of India is actively working with vaccine manufacturers & helping them in terms of facilitating more production units, financing and supply of raw materials,” said a statement released by the PM’s office.

The Prime Minister was also briefed about technical measures taken to make the vaccination process more peoplefriendly.

The review meeting comes a day after the US announced that it will distribute Covid-19 vaccines to India as part of its “strategy for global vaccine sharing”. Soon after the President’s announcement, US vice-president Kamala Harris called up PM Modi about the decision.

The vaccines India received will be part of the first tranche of 25 million doses of the 80 million to be donated by the US to several countries. India is part of two baskets -- through Covax and directly from the US -- but the exact numbers have not been released yet.

According to health ministry data, the cumulative number of Covid-19 vaccine doses administered in India has exceeded 227.5 million, including more than 3.3 million doses administered on Friday.