State set for mega inoculation drive
Jharkhand on Wednesday received its first consignment of 16,200 vials (0.162 million doses) of Covisheld vaccine
RANCHI: A day before the world’s biggest vaccination drive in the country, Jharkhand health officials remained on their toes for last minute preparations, as the mega inoculation drive is also set to be launched in state’s 48 centres.
In a bid to avoid inconvenience to eligible beneficiaries and unnecessary crowd at vaccination centres, a system driven information mechanism has been developed by the Centre, officials said.
State level nodal officer (vaccine) Dr Ajit Prasad said, “The beneficiaries will be informed through SMS or other sources on their registered mobile number regarding the health centre where the vaccination will be given and the scheduled time for the same.”
Prasad said the beneficiaries, who are registered for the vaccination on Saturday, would start receiving SMS from Friday. As many as 4,800 people are registered
for the vaccination on the launching day.
Earlier, the health department had planned to vaccinate 12,900 beneficiaries at 129 centres on the very first day.
However, as per the Centre’s latest directed number of centres has been reduced to 48. Altogether 100 people would get the shots per day at each centre.
“The centres were reduced, as we have received the doses in limited amount. Number of centres would be increased with arrival of more vaccines,” he said.
Jharkhand on Wednesday received its first consignment of 16,200 vials (0.162 million doses) of Covisheld vaccine from Pune based Serum Institute of India. The vaccines have been transported to all 24 districts, officials said.
“The vaccination exercise will begin from 9am and it will conclude at 5pm every day. On the launching day, the drive will begin after Prime Minister kicks off the event,” he said.
State health minister Banna Gupta on Wednesday had volunteered himself to be the first
to get the shot on Saturday. However, health officials said they would be able to give shots to only those people whose name would flash on portal for the day’s vaccination.
A total of 1.31 lakh frontline health care workers including doctors, nurses, ambulance drivers, sahiyas and sanitation workers have been identified in the first phase in the state.
“The active Covid patient or health worker would not be eligible for the vaccine, while those who have recovered the disease would be given the
shots,” Prasad said.
Jharkhand has till date has recorded 1.17 Covid cases, while about 1.15 lakh people have either recovered or discharged from the hospital.
A total of 1048 people have lost their lives due to the coronavirus.
The number of Covid cases has sharply declined in the state for past few months.
Meanwhile, Ranchi administration has prepared its two centres at Sadar Hospital and RCH Namkum for the drive. “We have completed our preparations for the vaccination drive from Saturday,” said Ranchi civil surgeon VB Prasad.
More than 18,000 frontline health workers would be vaccinated in Ranchi in the first phase. The district has received 1897 vials of the vaccine, officials said.
According to the state health officials, as many as two lakh frontline workers including police personnel, armed forces, home guards, jail workers and disaster management coordinators, municipal workers and people associated with social security organizations would be administered vaccine shots in second phase, while 62.97 lakh people above 50 years of age would be administered shots in the third phase.
The state has so far set up 275 cold chain points for proper storage of vaccines. This includes one state level and three regional level vaccine stores, 24 district vaccine stores and rest block vaccine stores.
State level vaccine store is in Ranchi and regional level vaccine stores have been set up in Deoghar, Palamu and Jamshedpur.