Manas Dasgupta
NEW DELHI, Oct 16: With the Covid-19 cases showing declining trend in the country and pace of vaccination completely slowed down, the central government has decided to stop, at least for the time being, purchase of fresh supply of vaccine and continue with its vaccination programme from the existing stock.
The union health ministry deciding against new procurement, has surrendered ₹4,237 crore, or nearly 85% of the 2022-23 budget allocation for inoculation purposes, to the Finance Ministry. According to the official sources, the governments at the centre and the state together still have a stock of over 1.8 crore doses of Covid vaccines, sufficient to continue the vaccination drive for around six months, given the low uptake of vaccines among people due to declining COVID-19 case burden.
Even if the government‘s stock gets exhausted, COVID-19 vaccines will be available in the market. “Any decision on whether to procure COVID-19 vaccine doses through the government channel or get (fresh) budget allocations for the purpose after six months will depend on the coronavirus situation prevailing in the country at that time,” an official sources said.
Since COVID-19 cases have been low, a sense of complacency has grown among people and there has not been much demand of vaccines even though the government conducted a 75-day drive — ‘Covid Vaccination Amrit Mahotsava’ — to administer booster doses to all adults free of cost.
“Considering this and the vaccines in the stockpile nearing their expiry date, the decision has been taken not to procure any more vaccines for now. Also, the Union Health Ministry has surrendered to the Finance Ministry the balance of ₹4,237.14 crore from its 2022-23 budget allocation of ₹5,000 crore for inoculation purposes,” the source said.
As part of the nationwide vaccination drive which began on January 16 last year, the Government of India has been supporting States and Union territories by providing them COVID-19 vaccines free of cost. According to the Ministry of Health and Family Welfare, 219.32 crore doses of the coronavirus vaccine have been administered to beneficiaries across the country so far.
Official sources said 98% of India’s adult population has received at least one dose of the COVID-19 vaccine while 92% have been fully vaccinated. Besides, 83.7% of adolescents aged 15 to 18 years have been vaccinated with the first dose since the vaccination for this age group began on January 3, while 72% have got both the first and second doses.
In the age-group of 12-14 years, 87.3% have been administered the first dose while 68.1% are fully vaccinated. Of the total eligible target population of 18 years and above, a little over 27% have been administered precaution doses so far.
India began administering precaution doses of vaccines to healthcare and frontline workers and those aged 60 and above with comorbidities from January 10, this year while it began inoculating children aged 12-14 from March 16. India on April 10 began administering precaution doses of COVID-19 vaccines to all aged above 18 years.
With 2,401 fresh cases, India’s COVID-19 tally now stands at 4,46,28,828; the number of active coronavirus cases in the country has gone up to 26,625, the Union Health Ministry said on Sunday. The death toll due to the viral disease has risen to 5,28,895 with 21 more fatalities, including 16 reconciled by Kerala, according to the ministry’s data updated at 8 am. The active cases account for 0.06 percent of the total caseload, while the national COVID-19 recovery rate has gone up to 98.76 percent, the ministry said.
An increase of seven cases was recorded in the active COVID-19 caseload in a span of 24 hours, it added. The daily positivity rate was recorded at 1.04 percent. The weekly positivity rate was recorded at 1.05 percent, according to the ministry.
The number of people who have recuperated from the disease has gone up to 4,40,73,308, while the case fatality rate was recorded at 1.19 percent. India’s COVID-19 tally had crossed the 20 lakh mark on August 7, 2020, 30 lakh on August 23, 2020, 40 lakh on September 5, 2020 and 50 lakh on September 16, 2020. It went past 60 lakh on September 28, 2020, 70 lakh on October 11, 2020, 80 lakh on October 29, 2020, 90 lakh on November 20, 2020, and the one-crore mark on December 19, 2020.
The country crossed the grim milestone of two crore coronavirus cases on May 4, 2021, the three-crore mark on June 23, 2021, and four crore cases on January 25 this year and added only 46 lakh more new cases in the last eight months.