309K get Covid-19 vax shots in Maharashtra; phase 2 starts today

Maharashtra’s vaccination figures have crossed the 300,000-mark after 40,331 (77%) of the 52,100 registered healthcare workers (HCWs) were immunised against Covid-19 on Monday across 531 centres

Maharashtra’s vaccination figures have crossed the 300,000-mark after 40,331 (77%) of the 52,100 registered healthcare workers (HCWs) were immunised against Covid-19 on Monday across 531 centres. So far, the state has inoculated 309,846 of the around 800,000 HCWs registered on the centralised CoWIN app. The state will start vaccinating frontline workers, including the police, sanitation workers and revenue department officials, from Tuesday, senior health department officials said.

A healthcare worker being administered the Covid-19 vaccine at BYL Nair Hospital on Monday. (Anshuman Poyrekar/HT Photo)

Mumbai too improved its turnout to 93.4% on Monday after 7,707 HCWs were inoculated. Of these, 5,746 vaccines were administered in the suburban district – which is 61% above its daily target – while the island city recorded 65% of its target after vaccinating 1,961 HCWs, data provided by the state health department revealed.

Mumbai ranks first in Maharashtra in terms of the highest number of vaccinations, with 46,359 HCWs receiving the shot. In Pune and Nagpur, 27,555 and 14,434 received the jab so far.

Phase 2 of the vaccination drive will be carried out simultaneously by the state health department from Tuesday. The department has also directed the district administrations to increase the vaccination centres. Around 580,000 frontline workers have enrolled themselves on CoWIN app for the vaccine shots till date.

“We carried out mock drills on Monday. The vaccination for frontline workers will start from Tuesday. We expect to increase our figures with simultaneous vaccination of two categories [HCWs and frontline workers],”said a state official, adding that the app is working better now. Around 90% of the entire process, including intimating the beneficiaries about the vaccine timing, is being carried out through the app.

However another official said that the Centre is yet to activate the ‘session live’ option for frontline workers on the app which could delay the phase 2 of vaccination drive. “The Union health ministry is yet to make the session live on CoWIN app. If they do it on late Monday night, we may start vaccination for frontline workers as well,” said a senior official.

Meanwhile, Maharashtra reported 1,948 Covid-19 cases on Monday, taking the state’s tally to 2,028,347. The active caseload stood at 43,701. With 27 fatalities, the death toll reached 51,109 (with 2.52% case fatality rate ). Of the 27 deaths reported, 15 occurred in the past 48 hours, while six are from last week. The remaining six deaths are from the period before last week. On Monday, 3,289 patients were discharged, taking the tally of recovered patients to 1,932,294 in the state, after which the recovery rate has improved to 95.26%. Maharashtra has tested 14,656,223 samples for the virus so far since the pandemic began. The overall positivity rate stood at 13.84%. In the past 24 hours, 39,055 samples were tested.