Express brings a ground report on the availability of vaccines across the State.
Shots in Tiruchy, short in Karur
The district received 10,410 doses of Covishield on Tuesday, and allotted 4,850 doses for usage on Wednesday. This includes 2,830 doses of Covishield and 2,020 doses of Covaxin doses. District Immunisation Officer (DIO) Dr Ram Ganesh says there’s enough vaccine supply for the next four days. In Karur, hospitals and public continued to bear the brunt of a shortage. Chokkalingam, a resident from Karur said, “When the government was requesting the people to get vaccine shots, the people weren’t interested and didn’t show up to receive a jab.
And now when the people have come to their senses and getting ready to receive vaccination, the government has disappointed them with shortage of vaccines.” Sundar, a social activist said “While many people aged above 45 years are still yet to get a jab due to shortage of vaccines across the country, the central government’s approval of vaccines for everyone aged above 18 years is just a reckless decision.”
Transport workers vaccinated in Chennai
As many as, 24,495 transport workers who are over the age of 45 have been administrated Covid 19 vaccine till Tuesday. Disclosing this to the press persons here on Wednesday, Transport Secretary C Samayamoorthy said over 70,000 workers above the age of 45 years are working in eight transport corporations. “So far, 37 per cent workers (25,459) have been vaccinated. The total strength of transport workers is 1.2 lakh. We are expediting the vaccination for the rest of the workers to ensure lives of the workers as well as the commuters are safeguarded.” On Tuesday, when the night lockdown came into force the transport corporations have operated 16,284 buses across the State which includes 2790 MTC buses and 345 SETC services, said Samayamoorthy.
Disappointment in Villupuram
Over 100 people scheduled for second shot of Covid vaccine were disappointed as the Villupuram GH ran out of stock. A 60-year old S Sethuraman, a retired government official and resident of Vandimedu told TNIE that he took the vaccine on the second week of March and he had come to the hospital for follow up. “The government keeps insisting us to take vaccine but then there is shortage. None of us who were scheduled got the doses today and we were not informed of when we will receive it further.” K Ayyanar, 45-years-old resident of K K Nagar who waited at the GH to get his shot said that there is fear of transmission in Villupuram as everyday the cases are on the rise by 50.
“Now I am perplexed whether I should go out normally or be isolated. We demand quicker delivery of the second doses.” According to sources from the Villupuram health department, “So far 16,774 people have been infected and about 800 people are currently receiving treatment in the hospital and 114 people have died in the district.” Meanwhile, Karaikal district administration will take all steps to ensure that there is no dearth of supplies in medicine and supplies for testing Covid-19 patients, Collector Arjun Sharma said. According to sources, there are 14,000 Covishield vaccine doses available in Karaikal. One thousand units of Remdesivir also arrived from Telangana a week ago.
Fresh supply to Coimbatore, Madurai
In what would come as a huge relief to health officials, a consignment of 46, 270 doses of Covishield is likely to reach Coimbatore soon. The batch is among the six lakh doses distributed by the State Vaccine Store (SVS) in Chennai to regional vaccine stores (RVS) on Tuesday. Besides Coimbatore’s share, the batch contains 12,470 Covishield doses for the Nilgiris district. “We would supply 19,800 doses to government and private health centres.
The process would go on for four days from Thursday. The remaining doses would be treated as buffer stock,” said an official in-charge of vaccine distribution. Meanwhile, depletion of vaccine stock slowed down the pace of vaccination in the district. On Tuesday, 2500 persons were inoculated as against the daily average of 8,000 to 11,000, sources said. Until Tuesday, 3,16,615 beneficiaries out of 38 lakh population in Coimbatore were inoculated. “We have a long way to go to vaccinate at least around 30 per cent of people to achieve herd immunity,” said a senior official.
Meanwhile, Madurai received 22,190 doses of vaccine on Wednesday. However, the official said that the stock is likely to last only for about four to five days. The District Vaccine Store located at Tallakulam, on Wednesday morning, received stock of allotted 22,190 doses of Covishield. Due to the mismatch between Covishield supply and demand, priority would be given to those who complete or are closer to completion of eight weeks, they added.
Over 55k vaccinated
State vaccinated 55,830 people on Wednesday. According to the Health Department data, among them, 21,899 were people above 60 years of age, 25,220 were 45 to 49 years with co-morbidities, 6,005 were frontline workers, and 2,739 healthcare workers. State vaccinated 49,23,935 people
( Inputs from Coimbatore, Madurai, Karur, Tiruchy, Chennai,Villupuram, Karaikal)