BENGALURU: A 35-year-old Asha worker in Davanagere had to be hospitalised briefly after she was given a shot of Covishield on Thursday. This is the ninth instance of an adverse event following a jab of Covishield in the state. The Asha worker suffered anxiety after she was administered the dose, leading to a drop in blood pressure. She was taken to Chitageri Hospital where she was observed for about 20 minutes, and allowed to leave.
Two Adverse Events Following Immunisation (AEFI) were reported on Thursday. A 37-year-old woman in Bengaluru and a 32-year-old woman in Mysuru suffered anxiety and recovered. Health Minister Dr K Sudhakar said, “Side-effects have appeared in around 2-3.5% of people, but there have been no casualties.”He said that the state had vaccinated 1.77 lakh people so far. “It will be a big challenge to vaccinate 1.5-2 crore people in the state in the next phase,” he added.
While the number of vaccination sessions targeted on Friday was achieved, only 42,425 people, or 52% of the 81,519 supposed to be vaccinated on Friday were covered, Sudhakar said.While Chitradurga was the best performing district with 75% coverage, Koppal had the poorest coverage of 20%. “Covishield has been administered to 1,36,882 and Covaxin to 1,774 people. As many as 8,47,908 lakh people have registered for vaccination in the first phase. Of this, 3,27,201 are government health warriors and 4,45,389 are private health warriors,” Sudhakar said. On Friday the state received 1,46,240 doses of Covaxin. He said that some people are hesitating to take the vaccine due to rumours, but maintained that the shot would keep disease away.
Side-effects
On January 20, 4 AEFI were reported: a 25-year-old woman in Bengaluru Rural, two 35-year-old women in Ramanagara, and a 35-year-old woman from Davangere.
All of them experienced anxiety and recovered.
On January 18, a 58-year-old man in Shivamogga developed side-effects two days after he took the jab. He passed away. The government has said that his death too was not related to the vaccine. On January 16, the day of the vaccine launch, a 43-year-old man in Ballari took the jab and and developed side-effects two days later. He passed away and the government has said that his death was not related to the vaccine.