India on Friday set a new record of daily 19 vaccinations with nearly 2.22 crore doses of vaccine doses administered by 8 pm alone, as state governments responded to a call given by the Union health ministry to mark PM Narendra Modi’s 71st birthday as "vaccine sewa day"
By the end of the day, this figure is likely to go near the 2.5 crore mark.
Globally, as per the available information, the record of carrying out the highest Covid vaccinations lay with China which had administered 2.45 crore vaccine shots in a day.
Earlier, a top government source had said: "The central government is aiming for a record 2 crore Covid vaccine doses on PM Modi's birthday. The union health minister is taking updates of vaccination doses across the country."
Union Health Minister Mansukh Mandaviya also encouraged beneficiaries to get themselves inoculated today.
"Great to see you wished PM @NarendraModi Ji by vaccinating yourself and booking others' slots. Let us all do #VaccineSeva by getting vaccinated and encouraging those around us to do the same!#HappyBirthdayModiji," he tweeted while responding to a tweet by a person who got the jab on Friday.
BJP had earlier said they will mark PM Modi's birthday by setting the record of the maximum number of Covid vaccine inoculations on the day, said sources.
The CoWin dashboard maintained by the Centre showed that the high inoculations were largely driven by Karnataka, Bihar, Uttar Pradesh, Madhya Pradesh while the shots were being given at more than 1 lakh vaccination sites—the highest ever—across India on Friday.
The majority of the vaccination sites were at the government hospitals with the private sector contributing a minuscule number only.
Notably, in states such as West Bengal and Jharkhand -- both ruled by non-BJP governments but have the lowest percentage of population covered with at least one dose of vaccine, there was no dramatic rise in vaccination on Friday.
Thus far, India has crossed the 1-crore mark only three times in single-day Covid vaccination — the first being on August 27.
Ahead of PM’s birthday, several states had planned special vaccination drives and while the Gujarat government had declared its intention to administer over 35 lakh doses of the Covid-19 vaccine today, the Assam government targeted to vaccinate 8 lakh people.
The Bihar government had said it will administer nearly 30 lakh doses on Friday.
As of Thursday, about 62 % of the adult population in India had received at least one dose of Covid shots while only about 20 % of the population was fully immunised. With high vaccination figures attained for a day on Friday, these figures are set to rise by over 2 notches each.
(With ENS inputs)