NEW DELHI: The Delhi government has identified 89 sites to roll out the Covid vaccination programme, beginning later this week, Health Minister Satyendar Jain announced on Sunday. He said 36 government and 53 private hospitals were chosen for the purpose.
“Delhi has 2.25 lakh healthcare workers who will get the vaccine first. The government will also include teachers who have worked as frontline workers in the time of the pandemic. The vaccines will start arriving between January 12 and 14. The government has prepared a very strong and robust storage system to store the vaccine,” Jain said.
The hospitals where the shots will be administered include AIIMS, Safdarjung, Lok Nayak, GTB, Hindu Rao, Max, Fortis, Apollo, BL Kapur and Sir Gangaram.
Vaccines to all the centres will be supplied by the government and will be free for the beneficiaries. There will be one Covid-19 vaccination centre each in every hospital. Around 10 healthcare staff will be deployed at each centre to facilitate the drive.
“The whole system of vaccination is ready and we are fully prepared to start the immunisation drive. Currently, we are only waiting for the vaccines and as soon as they start arriving, the work will start immediately,” Jain said.
The vaccine to be administered in Delhi may be the Oxford- AstraZeneca vaccine Covishield, being manufactured by Serum Institute of India.
The minister said the Delhi government had already requested the Centre to provide vaccines free of cost.
“On Saturday, Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal requested the central government to provide free vaccines to everyone. Earlier, in a meeting with the Union health minister, I also requested for the same. The Delhi government is of the view that every person should get the vaccine free of cost. From our side, every decision regarding Covid vaccination will be for the benefit of the people of Delhi,” Jain said.