Centre asks northeastern states, J&K to focus on second dose vaccination of 60-plus population

NEW DELHI: As administration of first dose of anti-Covid jabs have outperformed that of second doses, the Centre on Saturday asked eight north eastern states along with Uttarakhand and Jammu and Kashmir to focus on ramping up coverage of the second dose, particularly in the population above 60 years of age.

In these states, the coverage of both doses of the vaccine is “unsatisfactory” in the elderly population above 60 years of age – that is most vulnerable to SARS-CoV2 infection as well as fatality due to it, the health secretary Rajesh Bhushan underlined during a meeting with these states to review the vaccination status.

The Centre advised states to earmark doses, days and target the completion of the vaccination exercise for people above 60 years of age as the vulnerability of these people to Covid-19 makes this exercise of prime importance.

Meanwhile, the states and union territories were also asked to quickly saturate the first dose coverage among the 18-plus population.

A total of 68.33 crore doses of Covid-vaccines were administered till Saturday. Nearly 56% of the 94 crore adult population has received at least one dose of the vaccines, whereas around 17% of adults of age 18 years and above have got both doses.

The Centre asked states to closely monitor the stock from state-level stores to cold chain points, check rational distribution and restrict vaccine wastage to below 2%. States have been asked to update data on eVIN (electronic vaccine intelligence network) on a daily basis.

Bhushan chaired a review meeting with representatives from Jammu and Kashmir, Ladakh, Uttarakhand and the northeastern states — Arunachal Pradesh, Assam, Manipur, Meghalaya, Mizoram, Nagaland, Sikkim and Tripura.

The details of balance stock of 0.5 ml syringes, vaccination coverage among special groups such as transgender persons, persons with disabilities and prisoners and among women, particularly pregnant and lactating women, were also discussed during the meeting.

Courtesy : TOI

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