CHENNAI: With four lakh doses of Covaxin being needed to provide people with their second jabs, Tamil Nadu is no longer offering a first dose of the vaccine, said Health Minister Ma Subramanian on Wednesday.
According to the Health Minister, so far the State had received 39,08,250 doses of Covaxin and 36,31,545 doses had been administered. Private hospitals have a stock of 2,12,937 doses. The State has informed the Union Health Ministry that four lakh doses of Covaxin are needed to provide people with their second doses, he said.
As two doses of Covaxin are administered with a gap of just 28 days, there is a shortage. This is not the case with Covishield which has a longer gap between doses, the minister said, speaking to reporters at the Government Corona Hospital in King Institute, Guindy.
In Tamil Nadu so far 2.70 crore people have been vaccinated. The State had received 2.52 crore vaccine doses, excluding stock in private hospitals. The State has 8,89,877 doses of vaccine currently in stock and is expected to receive 27 lakh doses as part of its August supply from the Union Government in 13 days, the minister said.
So far, 2,03,07,691 people have received their first dose, and 48,58,628 people the second dose. As many as 2,74,011 pregnant women and 1,95,934 lactating mothers have received the vaccine in Tamil Nadu, Subramanian added.
The minister said that in five to 10 days a lab will be opened at the DMS campus by Chief Minister MK Stalin to conduct genome sequence analysis and detect coronavirus variants such as Delta. Equipment worth Rs 3 crore has been purchased for this and five medical technicians from Tamil Nadu were sent to InSTEM, Bengaluru for training.
In the two weeks since the launch of Makkalai Thedi Maruthuvam, 1.28 lakh people have benefited, he said.