NEW DELHI, Feb 4: Administering the second dose of Covid-19 vaccines to the healthcare workers who have taken the first dose will be started from February 13, NITI Aayog member Dr VK Paul said on Thursday.
Addressing a media conference, he said, “The second dose of vaccine will be administered to healthcare workers from 13th February. Only the first dose has been given to them so far,” he said.
The Union Health Secretary Rajesh Bhushan who was also present said 1,239 private and 5,912 public hospitals were being utilised as vaccination session sites. Bhushan also said the country’s Adverse Event Following Immunization (AEFI) system was robust and was strengthened for the purpose of Covid-19 vaccinations. He pointed out that only 0.18% of the persons vaccinated suffered from adverse events.
“There is a very structured & robust system of AEFI monitoring in this country. It has been further strengthened in view of Covid-19 vaccination. We have 8563 AEFI so far when we have done vaccination in lakhs. This is 0.18% of vaccinated people,” he said.
As per the government, 45,93,427 beneficiaries have been vaccinated against Covid-19 till 1.30 pm on Thursday. India was the fastest country to reach four million vaccinations. However, Union Health Ministry said there were 11 states and union territories, including Tamil Nadu, Assam and Jammu & Kashmir, which have inoculated 30% or fewer of their healthcare workers.
Pegged as the world’s largest vaccination programme, the first phase of the country’s vaccination drive began on January 16, after the government approved Serum Institute of India (SII) and Bharat Biotech’s coronavirus vaccines, with healthcare workers and front line workers being the first in line to be inoculated.
India recorded 12,899 new Covid-19 cases on Thursday which took the country’s overall tally to 10,790,183 while 107 new fatalities pushed the death toll to 154,703.
Meanwhile, the government said 97.38 per cent of the persons who have received the first shot of the vaccines have expressed overall satisfaction with the process.
The government has arrived at the figure by adopting a voluntary process of feedback from the vaccine recipients.
Unveiling the details of the system, Bhushan said a personalized SMS was being sent to all beneficiaries a day after their vaccination to collect feedback on the overall experience to help analyse the ongoing process.
He said after the beneficiaries confirmed on SMS that they have received the shot, they are asked four questions:
> If social distancing was maintained at the vaccination site.
> If the staff explained about the vaccination process and the vaccine that would be administered.
> If the staff informed about adverse event following immunisation.
> If they were asked to wait for 30 minutes after vaccination
If the beneficiaries do not reply to the SMS, then one outbound call is made. If the first call goes unanswered, a second call is being made in an interval of four hours. Participating in this process is not mandatory. The government sent the SMS to over 37 lakh beneficiaries, out of which 5 lakh replied and 97.38 per cent of these five lakh people expressed overall satisfaction with the process, Bhushan said.
Started on January 16, India’s vaccination drive, which is also the biggest and fastest vaccination drive in the world, has already covered 44,49,552 beneficiaries.
(Manas Dasgupta)