Day 2: Maha meets 53% vaccination target

Glitches in COWIN app and hesitancy play a major part in bringing down the number from 65% recorded on Day 1

MUMBAI: The state’s vaccination drive, which resumed after a break of two days on Tuesday, received poor response from healthcare workers, as only a little over 50% of the beneficiaries turned up to get inoculated. Across 274 centres, 14,883 beneficiaries were vaccinated, which is 52.68% of the state health department’s target to inoculate 28,251 in a day. The Brihanmumbai Municipal Corporation (BMC), which targeted 3,200 beneficiaries on Tuesday, managed to vaccinate 1,597 beneficiaries.

Tuesday’s overall turnout is lower than the turnout that was reported on January 16, when the vaccination drive kicked off in the state. Last Saturday, the state met nearly 65% of their target. In the first phase of the vaccination drive, the state has registered 785,927 doctors and healthcare workers as beneficiaries, and so far, in the two sessions of inoculation, 33,221 have been vaccinated.

In a bid to boost the daily immunisation numbers, the health department has asked all districts to start immunising health workers who are ready for vaccination but are not on the list for the day. Officials said they expect the numbers to improve in the coming days. Officials added that those who miss the day of their session will be inoculated at a later stage of the drive.

Senior health department officials attributed the low turnout to automated messages from COWIN app not reaching beneficiaries in some districts and also to hesitation of people to come forward. At some centres, the recipient’s names were repeated from Saturday’s list due to the technical glitch, officals said.

“There were incidents of the app performing very slowly on Tuesday as well. Therefore, at these locations, the administration went ahead by recording data offline,” said an official.

Another health department official said the app did not send out messages to the beneficiaries. The official said the daily numbers will increase in the coming days. “At some centres, the teams called health workers who were on the list. Some turned up, while many did not come. It could be hesitancy or maybe they have other engagements, we cannot say for sure. In the coming days, the numbers will improve,” he said, requesting anonymity.

Pradeep Vyas, principal secretary, state health department, said there were no reports of any adverse effects following immunisation on Tuesday. He, in a statement, also added that

the drive will continue on Wednesday.

Meanwhile, Maharashtra on Tuesday added 2,294 fresh Covid-19 cases to push the total tally to 1,994,977. Mumbai, meanwhile, reported 473 new cases, taking the city’s tally to 303,625. Mumbai reported eight fatalities, pushing death toll to 11,259. The active cases in the state went under 50,000 on Tuesday for the second time this month. The active caseload in the state dropped to 48,406. The state had recorded 48,801 active cases on January 4, following which it rose up to 54,000. Maharashtra reported 50 fatalities on Tuesday, pushing the toll in the state to 50,523. Of the 50 deaths reported, 35 occurred in the past 48 hours and five in the last week. The remaining 10 deaths are from the period before last week.