COVID-19 vaccination drive to begin in Rajasthan tomorrow

Jaipur: The first stage of COVID-19 vaccination drive will kick off in Rajasthan on Saturday. State health minister Dr Raghu Sharma said that all the preparations for the drive have been completed and the first consignment of the vaccines has reached the vaccination centers at six places in Jaipur district apart from 161 places across the state.

The minister said that Rajasthan has received around 5.63 lakh vaccine doses of two companies. State Vaacine Store, Jaipur has received 4,43,000 vaccine doses of Covishield of Serum Institute of India and 20,000 vaccine doses of Covaxin of Bharat Biotech. Similarly,1,00,500 doses have been made available at the State Vaccine Store, Udaipur.

Dr Sharma said that corona vaccines have been distributed at two places in the state. The vaccines in the districts of Udaipur division have been distributed from State Vaccine Store, Udaipur, while vaccine for districts in other divisions has been distributed from State Vaccine Store, Jaipur. The distribution of vaccines was done on January 14. Vaccine van, two drivers and RCHO or Deputy Chief medical officer, health officer and police personnel were called from all the districts to the concerned State Vaccine Store for the distribution of vaccines.

The health minister said that the beneficiary will be given the first dose of 0.5ml in the vaccination process starting from January 16. The second dose of 0.5ml of the same company will be administered after 28 days of the first dose.

Dr Sharma said that vaccination will take place for only four days in a week so that other health services are not affected during the corona vaccination. The vaccination drive will not take place on Thursday, Sunday and on government holidays. He said that vaccination will be done daily at 161 session places till January 31.

The Health Minister said that precautions have been taken while selecting all the session places so that arrangements for the treatment and timely referral of AEFI cases are available. Apart from this, all the district collectors have been directed to remain in contact with the concerned CMHO and RCHO through VC or other means for all other arrangements. He said that COVID vaccine will be stored between 2 and 8 degrees. There are three COVID vaccine stores at the state level, seven at the divisional level and 34 at the district level in the state. There are 2,444 cold chain points functional at the Community and Primary Health Centres. A vaccine van has been provided in each district.

Dr Sharma said that data of more than 6 lakh beneficiaries has been uploaded for COVID-19 vaccination on COVIN software by the evening of January 14. The beneficiaries include health workers of government, private and union ministries. There are 4,87,381 beneficiaries of the state government and private institutions and 6758 beneficiaries from the union ministries. Data of 1,01,761 frontline workers has been uploaded till now. The minister said that in the first phase 3345 government medical institutions and 2969 private institutions have been identified. Of these, 3736 session sites has been uploaded on COVIN software.