News Analysis India

Tag: Covid vaccination

  • 78% of India’s total jabs administered through onsite/walk-in vaccinations despite digital push

    Express News Service
    NEW DELHI:  Despite all its ‘Digital India’ push, the Modi government has been unable to make India take the digital route for getting inoculated against Covid-19. More than three-fourth of the total vaccine doses have been administered through onsite/walk-in vaccinations, the Centre has accepted in an affidavit to Supreme Court.

    “As on 23.06.2021, out of the 32.22 crore beneficiaries registered on CoWIN, 19.12 crore (nearly 59%) beneficiaries have been registered in the on-site mode,” stated the affidavit submitted last week. “As per the data available on CoWIN as on 23.06.2021, out of the total 29.68 crore vaccine doses recorded on CoWIN, 23.12 crore doses (nearly 78%) have been administered through on-site/walk-in vaccination,” it added.

    The figures validate the Supreme Court’s concerns over the Centre’s vaccination policy that was “exclusively relying on a digital portal” until severe criticism and a plethora of complaints forced a course correction on May 23, when on-site or walk-in registration and vaccination was opened for beneficiaries in the 18-44 age group.

    The central government had launched phase-wise Covid-19 vaccination drive on January 16 this year through Co-WIN digital platform with prior registration being required for getting the jabs. In a bid to make the online registration on the Co-WIN platform easy, the government has made various changes, such as making the portal available in Hindi and 14 regional languages including Marathi, Malayalam, Telugu, Kannada, Odiya, Gurumukhi, Bengali, Assamese, Tamil and Gujarati and removing the Captcha code. But even after those changes, a majority of people have opted for non-digital mode of registration, as the data from the CoWIN platform till June 23, cited in the affidavit, reveals.

    Before the government allowed walk-in vaccination facility, the mandatory online registration was seen to haveaccentuated India’s digital divide, with rich and urban Indians having much more access to the jabs than poor and rural folks. This divide was also seen to be a leading factor — apart from vaccine hesitancy behind slow pace of immunisation before the second wave of the pandemic started wreaking havoc. Lack of internet facility and smartphones in rural areas, apart from the complexities of navigating the CoWIN portal, were said to be preventing people in smaller towns and rural areas from accessing the vaccination facility. 

    The Supreme Court had also censured the mandatory online registration in a judgment on May 31. Pointing out the gaping digital divide that exists in the country, the court said the target of universal immunisation cannot be achieved by relying on a portal. The marginalised sections of society “would bear the brunt of this accessibility barrier” and this could have “serious implications on the fundamental right to equality and the right to health”, the SC said.

     In its affidavit, the Centre submitted that it was aware that lack of access to digital devices or internet may pose barriers to the citizens and hence it had allowed both on-site and digital registration for all age groups. The CoWIN system is inclusive and “there is no question of any person being left out due to any digital divide”, it asserted. 

    The government further said that on-site registration was not made available only to the beneficiaries in the 18-44 age group between May 1 and May 23 to prevent overcrowding at vaccination centres in view of the need for maintaining social distancing due to a massive surge in cases during the period.

  • Curtailing movement of un-vaccinated persons arbitrary, amounts to house arrest: Gauhati HC

    Express News Service
    GUWAHATI: The Gauhati High Court has held that the Mizoram government’s June 29 Standard Operating Procedure (SOP) debarring the un-vaccinated persons from venturing out, preventing them from eking out a living by restricting their movement as “arbitrary” and “not in consonance with the provisions of Article 14, 19 and 21 of the Constitution”.

    A division bench of Justice Michael Zothankhum and Justice Nelson Sailo observed that there is nothing to show that the vaccinated persons cannot be infected with the Covid virus or that they cannot be spreaders.

    “It has been brought to our notice that even persons, who have been vaccinated, can still be infected with the Covid virus, which would in turn imply that vaccinated persons who are Covid positive, can also spread the said virus to others.”

    “If vaccinated and un-vaccinated persons can be infected by the Covid virus and if they can both be spreaders of the virus, the restriction placed only upon the un-vaccinated persons, debarring them from earning their livelihood or leaving their houses to obtain essential items, is unjustified, grossly unreasonable and arbitrary,” the court observed.

    It said there is no reason to discriminate only against the un-vaccinated persons if the vaccinated and the un-vaccinated persons cover their faces with a mask as per Covid appropriate behaviour.

    The court said since the SOP requires everyone to adhere to the protocols, there should not be any discrimination against un-vaccinated persons as the protocols are also applicable to un-vaccinated persons.

    It pointed out that there can be any number of reasons for a person to leave his/her house. It could be for the purpose of procuring essential supplies including foodstuff, medicines, attending to his/her near and dear/sick ones etc.

    “However, the said clause has virtually put them under house arrest in violation of Article 21 of the Constitution of India, while persons who have been given the first dose of vaccine are allowed to leave their houses/compounds. Thus, on the ground of discrimination alone, Clause 5(2) is arbitrary,” the court observed.

    The next hearing has been fixed on July 14.

  • Number of COVID-19 vaccine doses administered in India has crossed 35 crore: Health ministry

    By PTI
    NEW DELHI: The cumulative number of COVID-19 vaccine doses administered in the country has exceeded 35 crore, the Union Health Ministry said on Saturday.

    As the new phase of universalisation of COVID-19 vaccination commenced from June 21, more than 57.36 lakh vaccine doses were given in the country on Saturday, as per a provisional report up to 7 pm.

    The ministry said 28,33,691 first vaccine doses and 3,29,889 second doses were given in the 18-44 years category on Saturday.

    Cumulatively, 99,434,862 people in this age group across all states and union territories have received their first dose and 27,12,794 have received their second dose since the start of phase-3 of the vaccination drive, the report showed.

    Uttar Pradesh, Madhya Pradesh, Rajasthan, Tamil Nadu, Bihar, Gujarat, Karnataka and Maharashtra have administered more than 50 lakh first doses of the COVID-19 vaccine in the age group of 18-44.

    Also, Andhra Pradesh, Assam, Chhattisgarh, Delhi, Haryana, Jharkhand, Kerala, Telangana, Himachal Pradesh, Odisha, Punjab, Uttarakhand and West Bengal have inoculated more than 10 lakh beneficiaries of the 18-44 years category with the first dose of COVID-19 vaccine, the ministry said.

    ALSO WATCH:

  • Maharashtra administers record seven lakh-plus coronavirus vaccine jabs

    By PTI
    MUMBAI: More than seven lakh COVID-19 vaccine doses, highest in a single day so far, were administered in Maharashtra on Saturday, a senior official said.

    “We surpassed our previous best performance…as of 7 PM we had administered 7,85,311 doses, the highest-ever figure for the state,” said health secretary Pradeep Vyas.

    Vaccination was going on at many centres and the final figure can cross eight lakh, he added.

    The previous record in the state was witnessed on June 26 when 7,38,704 doses were administered, Vyas said.

    With a total of 3,38,57,372 vaccine jabs given so far, Maharashtra has been at the top position in the country for more than three months, he said, thanking the health workers involved in the vaccination process for this feat.

  • COVID-19: Navi Mumbai civic body vaccinates sex workers

    By PTI
    THANE: The Navi Mumbai Municipal Corporation (NMMC) held a special anti-coronavirus vaccination camp for sex workers in the city, a civic official said on Saturday.

    The camp was organised on Friday as part of the civic body’s attempt to cover the neglected sections of the society under the vaccination programme, spokesperson of the NMMC, Mahendra Konde, said.

    Seventy-eight sex workers were administered vaccines during this drive, he said.

    The corporation’s drive to vaccinate the homeless people has been appreciated by the central government, the official added.

    NMMC Commissioner Abhijit Bangar said every effort was being made to cover every citizen in Navi Mumbai under the vaccination programme.

    “At present, there are 76 vaccination centres in the city and we are making arrangements to increase this figure to 100 to expedite the inoculation,” he said.

  • 216 crore Covid vaccine doses projected between August and December was ‘aspirational’: Centre

    Express News Service
    NEW DELHI: Conceding that the projection of 216 crore Covid vaccine doses between August and December this year was “aspirational”, the government on Friday conceded that the figure revised to 135 crore doses in the Supreme Court may be more realistic. 

    In a press conference on Covid status in the country by the Union ministry of health and family welfare, senior authorities said that these projections should be seen in the “right context”. 

    In May, the government had projected 216 crore Covid19 vaccine doses for India in the last five months this year but in a submission before the apex court on June 26, the target figure was lowered to 135 crore. 

    “The earlier estimate of 216 crore vaccine doses between August and December 2021 was an aspirational or optimistic one, “said VK Paul, member (health), Niti Aayog and chairman of the National Expert Group on Vaccine Administration for Covid. 

    “The figures should be seen in the right context as this is a dynamic situation.” 

    Paul further added that when the government proposed the estimate of 216 crore vaccines between August and December this year, it had collated the figures provided by vaccine makers, through their “responsible, optimistic and aspirational roadmap.” 

    ALSO READ | Now, pregnant women too can take Covid vaccine, says Centre

    “The private sector is very influential in India; they have such a major contribution to the GDP. They are reputed vaccine-maker conglomerates. We collated what they showed,” he said. 

    The official added that in its earlier estimate of 216 crore vaccine doses, the government had taken into account the future availability of Biological E, Zydus Cadila’s DNA vaccine, Novavax and Bharat Biotech’s nasal vaccines. 

    “But as far as the main vaccine makers – Serum Institute of India and Bharat Biotech — are concerned, at present 90 crore vaccine doses are estimated from each and this can also go up,” he said. 

    As per the affidavit filed in the court, the Centre has now projected availability of 50 crore doses of Covishield and 40 crore doses of Covaxin between August-December. In addition, 30 crore doses of vaccine by Bio E, 10 crore doses of Sputnik V and 5 crore doses of vaccine by Zydus Cadila are also slated to be available. 

    The government also claimed that the vaccination drive will get a further boost if it succeeds in its attempts to procure vaccines available outside India such as vaccines of Pfizer, Johnson & Johnson, Moderna. 

    “It is submitted that for the purpose of procurement of these vaccines from abroad, efforts are ongoing at the level of the highest political executive in the country and also at the highest diplomatic level,” read the affidavit.

    The Centre had maintained that since these efforts are at a very advanced stage, it is not possible to give comprehensive details but as and when these efforts materialise, “the speed of vaccination will be further augmented and enhanced”.

  • Fully-vaccinated 65-year-old Rajasthan woman tests positive for Delta Plus variant

    By Online Desk
    Rajasthan on Friday confirmed its first case of the Delta Plus variant of coronavirus in a 65-year-old woman from Bikaner, who had received both doses of the vaccine against Covid, according to a news18.com report. 

    The woman had already recovered from the Covid infection and had received both shots of Covaxin. She was asymptomatic and had recovered following treatment, the report said.

    “The patient’s sample was sent to NIV on May 31 and after 25 days, the state government received the reports which were then sent to Bikaner district collector for further action,” Bikaner’s PBM Hospital Superintendent Parmendra Sirohi was quoted as saying in the report.

    Bikaner CMHO OP Chahar said: “Special instructions have been issued for tracing in and around the residence of the woman. All those people who tested positive in the area in the last one month will be tested again.” 

    ALSO WATCH | Delta Variant is ‘most transmissible’ identified so far: WHO

    The sample of the woman was sent to the National Institute of Virology in Pune on May 30 for genome sequencing and her test report came on Friday. The CMHO said the sampling will be conducted on Saturday in the Bangla Nagar area where the woman lives.

    Meanwhile, CM Ashok Gehlot said his government is taking this issue seriously. There will be no laxity in services and the new guidelines will ensure that the Delta Plus variant does not spread across the state, the CM further said.

  • Soon, you may avail Covid vaccine at your doctor’s clinic next door

    Express News Service
    NEW DELHI: The Centre is planning to allow single doctor clinics across India to offer Covid vaccines in yet another tweak in its vaccination policy for coronavirus, The New Indian Express has learnt. 

    As per the Centre’s existing Covid vaccination strategy, 25% of the total vaccines available in the country are to be procured by private hospitals and offered to recipients at a price — Rs 150 administrative cost plus the actual price of the vaccine per dose — while in government hospitals, jabs are to be administered free of cost. 

    However, in terms of actual vaccinations carried out so far, the role of private hospitals has remained quite limited and only private hospitals in some cities have been able to participate in a big way. 

    In the most populous states such as UP and Bihar, where there are a few corporate hospitals, inoculations have largely been conducted in government facilities, data by the Centre show. 

    As of Saturday, there were only 2,417 private hospitals carrying out Covid vaccinations accounting for less than 5% of 54,977 vaccination centres across India. 

    “The proposal of permitting single doctor clinics to carry out Covid vaccinations has been given in-principal approval after many states suggested this and bodies of private hospitals also recommended that this move will raise their participation,” said a senior official in the Union Health Ministry. 

    ALSO READ | Over 1.45 crore COVID-19 vaccine doses available with states: Centre

    “This will allow people to access vaccines at their trusted doctors next door and help remove the vaccine hesitancy which is emerging as an issue in many towns,” the official added. “However, there is a concern related to the monitoring of adverse events following immunisation and detailed guidelines for it are being worked out.” 

    Another source in the ministry said that in some states, state aggregators have already started asking doctors practising independently to raise the demands which will then be conveyed to vaccine makers via the Centre. 

    Representatives of private hospitals, meanwhile, welcomed the proposal. “It is a much-needed step as vaccination has now reached almost a saturation level in big cities while a large population in smaller towns are yet to get the shots,” said Girdhar J Gyani, director general of the Association of Healthcare Providers of India, a body of private hospitals. 

    Gyani added that if the vaccination service is offered by the regular doctors people see in their neighbourhood, it will help overcome the vaccine hesitancy to a great extent. 

    The government has been emphasising that it wants more private hospitals, especially those in far-flung and remote areas and smaller ones, to come forward to take part in the vaccination drive. 

    It has said that this scale-up is required to remove the regional inequity in access to vaccination.

  • Are vaccines effective against Delta Plus variant? Assessment report in 10 days, says Centre

    By Express News Service
    NEW DELHI: Top government authorities on Friday announced that within 7-10 days, the results of experiments being carried out to assess the efficacy of the existing Covid vaccine against the Delta Plus variant of SARSCoV2 will be out.

    The announcement comes amid concerns that this variant, now detected in nearly 50 samples in 11 states — Maharashtra, Madhya Pradesh, Punjab, Gujarat, Kerala, Andhra Pradesh, Tamil Nadu, Odisha, Rajasthan, Jammu, and Karnataka — may potentially have immune evasive properties and may be capable of causing more severe disease.

    In a first-ever study in the world, declared ICMR director general Balram Bhargava on Friday, India will come up with its finding on how effective the vaccines are against the delta plus variant — which is B1.617.2 or delta variant with K1417N mutation — reported in 12 countries thus far.

    Such data is available nowhere globally, said Bhargava, adding that the report will be available in 7 to 10 days.

    In a press briefing on Friday on Covid19 status in the country, senior officials said that Covid vaccines — Covaxin and Covishield — are effective against coronavirus variants of concern, such as alpha, delta, gamma, and delta.

    The existing vaccines, however, have reduced effectiveness against the delta variant, which is now the most dominant variant in India and is being seen in nearly 90% of the samples.

    ALSO READ | 48 Delta Plus Covid variant cases detected in India; Maharashtra records highest: Government

    While Covishield has shown a two-fold reduction in neutralising antibodies, it is down by 3 fold in the case of Covaxin, Bhargava said, also assuring that vaccines can be modified structurally to work better against emerging variants. 

    “It can be done more easily in case of RNA vaccines but can also be done in case of whole inactivated virus-based vaccines and adenovirus-based vaccines,” he stressed.

    Department of biotechnology secretary Renu Swarup underscored that the reported delta plus variant cases in India, so far, are localised in some districts and have largely been seen in isolated cases. 

    Studies are underway currently to understand whether this variant is associated with increased transmissibility, change in virulence, or disease presentation and has any effect on diagnostics, drugs, and vaccines.

    S K Singh, Director, National Centre for Disease Control highlighted that forming a scientific opinion on a variant takes time and clarified that the “plus” in the name of variant does not denote more virulence.

    “The plus is an addition of an existing variant due to its properties.  It does not mean that it is stronger than delta. If scientific evidence suggests so in future, we will inform the public about it,” he said.

  • Hospital stay, ICU need, treatment cost lower for those vaccinated against Covid-19, finds study

    Express News Service
    NEW DELHI: Those vaccinated against Covid-19 have a significant advantage when it comes to average duration of hospital stay, ICU requirement, treatment cost and mortality — even if they needed hospitalization — as compared to those without jabs, a first-of-its-kind study from India has shown.

    A retrospective research carried out by Star Health insurance among 3,820 patients with its health insurance policies who landed up in 1,104 hospitals across the country in March and April says while the mean stay in hospital was 7 days for the unvaccinated, it was 4.9 days for those who were vaccinated.

    Among 3,820 patients with Covid-19, 3301 or about 86.4 % were unvaccinated while 519 or 13.6% were vaccinated.

    The findings showed that among the unvaccinated population 8.8% required ICU and this was lesser — 6% — among the vaccinated and the need for ICU was further lesser at 3 % after two doses of the vaccines.

    Among those who received two doses of vaccination there was a 66% relative risk reduction in ICU stay and 81% relative risk reduction in mortality, the paper noted, adding that even among those with comorbidities, a single dose was able to significantly reduce average length of hospitalization and treatment expenses.

    ALSO READ | COVID-19: Delta variant 40% more transmissible, able to evade 55% of immune protection, says study

    The mortality among unvaccinated patients was 0.5% while there was no mortality among the vaccinated.

    Also, while the mean total hospital expense among the unvaccinated was Rs 2,77,850, it was Rs 2,17,850 or about 22% lesser for those who caught the infection at least 14 days after the second dose of vaccination.

    Dr S Prakash, managing director of the insurance firm which has handled more than 3 lakh Covid-related claims during the pandemic so far, said that the study was aimed at understanding in exact terms what benefit vaccination offered for patients, the healthcare industry and the country as a whole.

    “The point that needs to be highlighted is that this is a first-of-its-kind study from a health insurance company in India done on a nationwide basis during the early period of vaccination in March and April,” he noted.   

    His co-author and joint vice president of the company Dr Madhumati Ramakrishnan said: “Those who took the vaccine had a clear advantage over the non vaccinated as there was a significant difference in terms of parameters like hospital stay, need for ICU, cost of treatment and death due to infection.”

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    Highlighting the results, their paper said that these findings may be used in motivating the public and promoting the vaccination drive. The research paper also stressed that its coverage of pan-India data from a health insurance point of view was unique and analyzed not only the medical benefits but also the financial implications. 

    “This may pave way in educating and motivating the public regarding the role of vaccination in reducing morbidity, mortality and hospital expenses,” the authors noted.