Vaccination camps in Delhi’s private schools to increase coverage among teens

From Wednesday, teams from the north-west district reached out to all private schools in their area to administer the first and second dose of the Covid-19 vaccine to teenagers in the 15-18 year age group

To overcome the problem of low vaccination among teens in private schools, as compared to their government school counterparts, the administration in now setting up vaccination camps in private schools to encourage students to get inoculated, senior government officials said on Thursday.

Officials said till February 3, about 95% of students from government schools have received at least the first dose of the vaccine, but only 73% students from government-aided schools and 62% from private schools have been inoculated with the first dose so far. (Representative image/HT Photo)

From Wednesday, teams from the north-west district reached out to all private schools in their area to administer the first and second dose of the Covid-19 vaccine to teenagers in the 15-18 year age group. Similar outreach programmes are being planned by the other districts in the capital, officials said.

Cheshta Yadav, district magistrate (north-west), said considering that most of the government vaccination centres were set up in government schools since last year, there is a greater acceptance and awareness among children of those schools as compared to private school students. Reaching out to private schools will help encourage children to come out and get their vaccine doses.

“It is true that vaccination among private school children is comparatively lower, our idea behind reaching out to private schools is to create awareness and give students easy access to the vaccination drive,” said Yadav.

Officials said till February 3, about 95% of students from government schools have received at least the first dose of the vaccine, but only 73% students from government-aided schools and 62% from private schools have been inoculated with the first dose so far.

According to government estimates, Delhi has about 1,014,000 teenagers who are eligible to receive the vaccine. Of them, 750,000 are enrolled in government schools, 330,000 in private schools and around 50,000 in government-aided schools.

“While the vaccination coverage in that age group has been better compared to other age categories, we have seen that the number of vaccinated teens in private schools and government-aided schools is significantly lower as compared to those from Delhi government schools. Our vaccination teams are going all out to ensure that there is 100% vaccination among school-going teenagers,” said a senior health department official, asking not to be named.

Delhi government data shows that till February 15, the city had administered 892,574 first doses and 346,984 second doses for the 15-18 years cohort.

The south-west district vaccinated the most number of children with the first dose -- it has administered 120,358 shots since January 3 when vaccinations opened for that age category.-- followed by the north-west district, which had administered 115,452 first doses to teenagers.

Vikram Singh Malik, district magistrate (south-west), said, “Our first step was to source data of all eligible children from the education department and map schools and the spatial distribution of immunisation centres. We have also been conducting regular online meetings with heads of schools to allay their apprehensions and misconceptions about vaccination. Meetings with parents, through heads of schools and student counsellors, for disseminating proper information about vaccination also helped us achieve the maximum reach.”

When it comes to administering the second dose, north-east Delhi is leading the districts with 49,744 second doses administered, followed by the south-west district with 45,265 doses.

Health experts said the vaccination drive in the Capital could have generally slowed down, considering that the city was at the peak of the third Covid-19 wave until recently.

“Vaccination programmes generally tend to slow down a little during the peak of a Covid wave because people are wary about visiting vaccination centres. In the case of children, parents and guardians are doubly careful. Now that cases have gone down, the administration should concentrate on improving vaccination coverage so that maximum people, including children, are protected before another wave,” said Dr Jugal Kishore, head of department of community medicine at Safdarjung Hospital.