With two weeks left at the end of the year, the country is still far from its goal of immunizing all adults by that time.
With about 87% of India’s adults receiving at least one dose of the COVID-19 vaccine and 56% fully vaccinated, the government’s current priority is to increase the second dose, officials said. Hindu,
With two weeks left at the end of the year, the country is still far from its goal of vaccinating all adults by that time.
So far, 136.7 crore doses have been given, of which 826 crore are first and 541 crore are second. During the year, the target is to vaccinate 94 crore adults by December 31, as claimed by several Union ministers.
However, since October 16 to 22, the second dose number has steadily increased compared to the first. From 21 million second doses and 159 million first doses in that week, the first dose fell to 12 million in the week of 11-17 December and 336 million in the second. So far, India has provided at least 60% of its population with one dose and 40% fully vaccinated. The government has yet to approve vaccines as well as booster doses for children, even as global concerns emerge of the Omron variant being able to elicit protective antibodies in people who are exposed to a live infection.
While targeting 100% of the population is “ideal” while experts say it is “ideal” to reach 10%-20%, it is challenging to reach the previous 10%-20%, as shown by the experience of past vaccination programs, said Samiran Panda, who works in Indian Epidemiology and Infectious Diseases. Head of the section. Council of Medical Research (ICMR).
innovative approach
“While it is ideal to vaccinate the entire population, I would instead want to completely vaccinate 80% of the population. All in all, that would be a tremendous achievement in itself,” said Dr. Panda. Hindu, “Logistics, vaccine hesitancy, geographic challenges all play a part in reaching the last segment of the population. We have a project to deliver vaccines via drones, called i-Drones, and you have to adopt innovative methods like this for full coverage. ,
More than 60 countries around the world are providing booster doses and in India at least four clinical trials are underway to test the feasibility of combining approved vaccines and using them as booster doses.
Of the vaccines so far administered, Covaxin comprises about 10%. Its maker Bharat Biotech said in May that it took four months for a batch of Covaxin to be manufactured and ready for supply. That month, Dr VK Paul, president of the National Empowered Group on Vaccines, said India would have about 216 crore doses from August-December. But when the Union health ministry said in an affidavit to the Supreme Court in July that only 135 crore doses would be available, he clarified that his estimate was “aspirational”.
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