HYDERABAD: The Telangana government is reportedly upset over the Centre’s latest policy of allocating only 25 per cent of the total Covid-19 vaccine doses produced in the country to the States, while reserving 50 per cent for itself and the remainder for private hospitals.
According to official sources, the highly ‘discriminatory’ policy was making it difficult for the States to procure vaccines by floating global tenders. They said that though Hyderabad was the producer of one of the Covid-19 vaccines, the Centre’s policy came in the way of procuring it for Telangana as vaccines were allocated regardless of their place of manufacture.
The Telangana government is of the view that the Centre, instead of strengthening the States’ hands in their fierce battle against Covid-19, is hampering their vaccination drives.There are about one crore people in the State above 45 years of age, but the government only has 66.63 lakh vaccine doses till June 5, of which 65.75 lakh doses have already been used.
Moreover, the State had decided to vaccinate everyone in the age group of 18 to 45 years, and had placed orders for 23.25 lakh vaccine doses with manufacturers to buy them with its own money. But the companies delivered only 7.4 lakh doses owing to the restrictions imposed by the Centre, the sources said.