- It’s a proverbial scenario playing out in the country looking at the way vaccination drive is meandering along after yearning desperately for many months soon after the virulent virus started spreading its dreaded tentacles. Recollecting the horror tales in the initial months when the pandemic was declared is still fresh in our memories as the uncertainty surrounding the as yet unknown entity wrought havoc substantially. Everybody was left with prayers on the lips fervently expressing wishes to find effective vaccines to combat the menace. Prayers answered and credit to the scientific community and experts who went about saving humanity with absolute diligence.
- The emerging outcome is there for all to see as more and more vaccine candidates are invented to save humanity from the debilitating effects. It is a proud moment for India as a nation to be recognized as one of the foremost proponents and exponents of vaccine manufacturing as well as indigenously producing the elixir of life. One of the very few countries to have succeeded in inventing the vaccines, India also initiated due measures to proceed ahead with the vaccination drive in a well-calibrated and phased out manner listing the priority groups without any ambiguity. However, there are teething challenges visible during the ongoing vaccination campaign.
- As the statistics reveal three weeks into the anti-COVID vaccination drive, we are far from the target of inoculating a 30 crore priority group of health and frontline workers, senior citizens, and those with comorbidities by July with 60 crore doses requiring 33 lakh daily inoculations. Agreed, it is a humongous task to ensure the intended beneficiaries are receiving the vaccines. Nonetheless, widespread apprehensions surrounding the campaign – even seen in Doctors and Nurses – is proving to be a daunting challenge as around 2 lakh there or thereabouts of intended groups are volunteering to get vaccinated. Very few numbers indeed.
PC: Chetana Belagere
- Note that as per NSO 2017-18 data just 30% of patients visit government facilities for treatments as against 40% to private doctors/clinics and 23% to private hospitals showing how the public healthcare sector is not fully trusted by the citizens. As such, there is a strong case to coopt a significant chunk of private capacity to augment the vaccination efforts to reach the intended target without delay. Though logistical scales are incomparable, the ongoing National Polio Immunization Drive did cover 89 lakh children involving 12 lakh vaccinators and 1.8 lakh supervisors. Thus, requisitioning private health infrastructure is of the essence to defang the virus.
- Most importantly, aggressively leveraging the available 30,000 primary health centers should be prioritized as also information blitzkrieg is undertaken to clear persisting doubts and misinformation surrounding the vaccine. More delay in embarking widespread coverage, more likely the scenario of some mutant variants further creating havoc on the already battered ecosystem. It is irrelevant to boast of India’s inoculation numbers with other nations simply because our population density at 1.35 billion which is only second to China. Therefore, sequestering private enterprise facilities is a no-brainer thereby opening vaccination to the general public to reach the inoculation goal.
PC: ISH News
- With few more vaccine candidates expected to receive approvals in the coming weeks, making available these to private unutilized facilities makes imminent sense to speed up the process of mass coverage. It is annoying to keep hearing about the technical glitches hindering the Co-WIN app and the same should be fixed at once to function satisfactorily. Dangers of the virus is still lurking around. The time to speed up efforts is now.
