Rajasthan appeals to healthcare staff to come forward for Covid vaccination

In view of the low turnout for Covid-19 vaccination, Rajasthan chief minister Ashok Gehlot has appealed to the healthcare workers to come forward to take the jab. The three days of vaccination which started on January 16 has witnessed participation of 32,379 healthcare workers against the target of 49,131.

The program has witnessed a steady decline in participation against the set targets for all three days with 73.79% of the intended beneficiaries taking the jab on day 1, followed by a dip on Day 2 to 68.72% and 54.89% on Tuesday. The health official held the technical glitch in the Co-Win app as the chief cause for the declining number of participants.

However, the CM held the verbal exchange between the two vaccine manufacturers as the reason behind the decline in participation.

“Health workers have come in fewer numbers for vaccination. This is also due to the exchange of words done for commercial reasons between the two vaccine manufacturers. Yesterday, Bharat Biotech released guidelines regarding its vaccine. If these guidelines were issued earlier, people's trust would have increased in the vaccine,” tweeted Gehlot.

In another tweet, he said, “I appeal to the health workers to come forward to get the vaccine.”

Gehlot's statement came a day after the state government urged the Central government to allow on spot registration of beneficiaries as the vaccination program was hindered due to technical glitches in the CoWin app.

A senior doctor said the CoWin application does not work effectively and has problems. The beneficiaries didn’t receive the messages for vaccination on time and were later called telephonically.

“We have asked the GoI to allow vaccination through on-spot registrations as there is some technical snag with the software,” stated Dr Sudheer Bhandari, Principal SMS Medical College.