Tag: Covid-19 vaccine wastage

  • ‘Centre seems hell-bent to project things in poor light’: Jharkhand trashes charges of 37.3 per cent vaccine wastage

    By PTI
    RANCHI: Hitting out at the Centre, the Jharkhand government on Wednesday said it is wrong to project vaccine wastage proportion is as high as 37.3 per cent in the state whereas the fact remained that it is much below the national average and currently stands at 4.65 per cent.

    The Jharkhand government retort comes a day after the centre said despite urging states repeatedly to keep vaccine wastage below 1 per cent, many states such as Jharkhand (37.3 pc) were reporting much higher wastage than the national average (6.3 pc).

    The opposition BJP latched on the issue to attack JMM- Congress-RJD coalition government and sought to know as who is responsible for such a high wastage of vaccine in the state.

    Chief minister Hemant Soren lashed out at the centre, saying how can one imagine that Jharkhand will allow its “suraksha kavach” (protective gear) to go waste? Asserting how can a state allow about lakh of doses go waste, Soren said it was explained to the centre that poor connectivity in forest areas and lack of network issues are behind slow updation of data.

    “However, the centre seems hell-bent to project things in a poor light which is causing problem to poor states like Jharkhand. This is why the state had gone to the Supreme Court for allowing its platform for vaccination,” Soren told PTI.

    Jharkhand’s nodal officer for COVID-19 vaccination A Dodde said, “It is wrong to project that the vaccine wastage percentage is as high as 37.3 per cent whereas it is 4.65 per cent, much below the national average of 6.3 percent.

    “Jharkhand with its tough terrains, difficulties, geographical complexities and technical glitches has not been able to update data,” he told PTI.

    State Health minister Banna Gupta accused the centre of tarnishing the state’s image on the basis of “false data and projections”.

    Dodde said the facts were explained to government of India officials in a meeting on Tuesday in which the centre advised states and UTs to plan for scaling up vaccination coverage through available stocks and anticipated supplies till the end of June.

    The private hospitals were advised not to allow offline vaccine registration and all registration should be online.

    Union Health Secretary Rajesh Bhushan had held a review meeting through video conference with administrators from states and UTs on the progress of vaccination, modifications on CoWIN software that will provide more flexibility to vaccine administrators,along with the effective implementation of SOPs for containment and management of COVID (particularly in areas underserved by health infrastructure).

    A detailed presentation on the progress of the countrywide vaccination drive was presented, with a focus on states and UTs that are lagging behind in providing coverage to the vulnerable population groups.

    “Whereas states have been urged repeatedly to keep vaccine wastage below 1 per cent, many states such as Jharkhand (37.3 pc), Chhattisgarh (30.2 pc), Tamil Nadu (15.5 pc), Jammu and Kashmir (10.8 pc), Madhya Pradesh (10.7 pc) are reporting much higher wastage than the national average (6.3 pc),” Union Health Ministry had said.

    The chief minister’s office said the state government is fully focused on utilising its available vaccine doses in the most prudent manner possible ensuring minimal wastage.

    “We hope to minimise it further with more focused vaccination awareness campaigns in deep forested and other rural areas of the state,” it said.

    Officials said total vaccines supplied to all districts is 48.63 lakh while total vaccines utilised is 40.12 lakh and the wastage percentage comes to 4.63 per cent.

    The state said it has 6.56 lakh doses of vaccines available with it.

    The vaccine wastage issue triggered a political row in Jharkhand.

    State BJP President and MP Deepak Prakash launching a scathing attack on state government for “high wastage of vaccine” sought to know from the state government as to who was responsible for this – state or the centre.

    Congress leader and state’s health minister Banna Gupta said, “The central government is trying to malign the state with fake statistics. It is misleading the entire country with such fake data.”

    He urged Prime Minister Narendra Modi to have a look at the state’s data.

    Fearing exclusion of a large chunk of the tribal people in the ongoing vaccination drive against COVID-19 due to non- availability of smartphones among many of them and access to internet in remote areas, the Jharkhand government had earlier filed a plea with the Supreme Court for directions to use its own “more user-friendly” platform for registration.

    The JHAR-WIN app, the officials said worked both online and offline and is backed up with a call centre to facilitate registration of low-digitally literate population group and can provide on the spot registration at vaccination centres, officials had said.

    They said it was suited to a state with as high as about 27 per cent tribal population.

  • After data ‘mismatch’, Haryana says only 2-3 per cent vaccine wastage in state

    Express News Service
    CHANDIGARH:  The Haryana government has said the Covid-19 vaccine wastage in the state has come down from 6 per cent, as per the data recently released by the Centre government, to 2-3 per cent. The state health department said the vaccine wastage percentage was relatively higher in the data released by the Centre as there was a data “mismatch” and the districts have rectified it.

    The state has, so far, administered a total of 53.72 lakh doses, with Gurugram reporting the highest at 6.34 lakh followed by Faridabad (5 lakh). Additional chief secretary (health) of the Haryana government Rajeev Arora said in a data recently released by the Centre government, Haryana had a 6 per cent wastage of Covieshield and 10.2 per cent wastage of Covaxin.

    Thereafter, the officers of the health department immediately swung into action and identified that there was a data mismatch. He said the officers concerned corrected the data mismatch and subsequently, the wastage percentages dropped from 6 per cent for Covieshield to 3.1 per cent and 10.2 per cent of Covaxin to 2.4 per cent. Thus, the average wastage percentage is between 2 per cent to 3 per cent.

    He elaborated that director of the National Health Mission, Haryana, Prabhjot Singh, along with the state immunisation team held two orientation programmes with all officers of the health department involved in vaccine administration of all districts through video-conferencing. Thereafter, the districts with high wastage were identified and separate consultation was given to them.

    Arora said the districts which reported high vaccine wastage were Hisar, Palwal, Nuh, Kaithal, Rohtak and Bhiwani. Arora said 2,07,892 healthcare workers (HCWs) have been administered the first dose of vaccine and 1,33,828 HCWs have been administered the second dose of vaccine. 

  • COVID-19: Haryana reports highest vaccine wastage followed by Assam, Rajasthan

    By ANI
    NEW DELHI: Haryana, Assam and Rajasthan are among the top three states that reported the highest percentage of COVID-19 vaccine wastage, said the Union Health Ministry on Tuesday.

    As per the Ministry, Haryana reported 6.49 vaccine wastage, followed by Assam with 5.92 per cent, and Rajasthan with 5.68 per cent.

    About 5.67 per cent vaccine wastage was recorded in Meghalaya, 5.20 per cent in Bihar, 5.19 per cent in Manipur, 4.94 per cent in Punjab, 4.5 per cent in Dadra and Nagar Haveli, 4.13 per cent in Tamil Nadu and 3.36 per cent in Nagaland

    As per the ministry, the Government of India has so far provided nearly 18 crore vaccine doses (17,93,57,860) to States/UTs free of cost. Of this, the total consumption including wastages is 16,89,27,797 doses (as per data available at 8 am today).

    More than 90 lakh COVID Vaccine doses (90,31,691) are still available with the States/UTs to be administered. States with negative balance are showing more consumption (including wastage) than vaccine supplied as they have not reconciled the vaccine they have supplied to Armed Forces, it said.

    More than 7 lakh (7,29,610) vaccine doses will be received by the States/UTs within the next three days, said the Union Health Ministry on Tuesday.

    As per government data, Maharashtra received the highest number of vaccine doses (1,82,52,450) followed by Uttar Pradesh with 1,51,31,270; Gujarat with 1,48,70,490; Rajasthan with 1,47,37,360; West Bengal with 1,20,83,340; Karnataka with 1,09,28,270; Madhya Pradesh with 94,79,720; Bihar with 87,65,820; Kerala with 78,97,790 and Tamil Nadu with 76,43,010 doses respectively.

    Out of the above-mentioned doses, the amount of vaccine doses consumed by these states including wastage is the highest in Maharashtra (1,75,33,889) followed by Uttar Pradesh (1,38,60,390).

    As per the ministry’s data till May 11, 8 am, the balance availability of vaccine doses is highest in Uttar Pradesh at 11,52,091 doses followed by Gujarat at 8,32,398; Tamil Nadu at 7,89,619; Madhya Pradesh at 5,59,271; Bihar at 5,26,396; Maharashtra at 4,98,756; Chhattisgarh at 4,12,768; Jharkhand at 4,04,357; Haryana at 3,72,831 and Delhi at 3,66,731 doses respectively.

    Meanwhile, India reported a slight dip in new COVID-19 cases with 3,29,942 fresh infections were recorded in the last 24 hours, according to Union Health Ministry on Tuesday.

    However, the country recorded more recoveries during this period as 3,56,082 new discharges were reported. With 3,876 new deaths due to COVID-19, the cumulative toll mounted to 2,49,992 deaths.

    The total positive cases now stands at 2,29,92,517, including 1,90,27,304 recoveries. At present, there are currently 37,15,221 active coronavirus cases in the country.