Mumbai civic body chalks vax plan for potential superspreaders; drive only for 30+

The Brihanmumbai Municipal Corporation (BMC) has decided to vaccinate on priority “potential superspreaders” or those who are in touch with multiple people daily, in order to control the spread of Covid-19, amid the threat of a third wave

The Brihanmumbai Municipal Corporation (BMC) has decided to vaccinate on priority “potential superspreaders” or those who are in touch with multiple people daily, in order to control the spread of Covid-19, amid the threat of a third wave. This category includes auto-taxi drivers, hawkers, delivery executives, restaurant staff, daily wage workers, among others. Further, although the Central government has allowed all citizens above the age of 18 to get vaccinated for free starting Monday, however, in Mumbai, vaccination will be conducted only for those who are 30+, following the state’s directives.

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The BMC is exploring various options to develop a mechanism to start vaccination of citizens in these categories. A final decision on the same is expected to be taken this week. The plan is similar to the earlier model of testing on priority such individuals who come in touch with multiple citizens on a daily basis.

According to BMC officials, one of the options is to start vaccination for citizens under the superspreader category on a walk-in basis, however, nothing has been decided yet. Also, there are deliberations over whether citizens above 18 must be allowed under this category or only citizens above 30, which is permitted by the state government.

The state government had on Friday allowed vaccination for citizens between the age group of 30 and 45. The vaccination drive for the 18-45 age group will be restarted in a phased manner considering the supply of doses, the officials said.

Dr Mangala Gomare, chief of BMC’s Public Health Department said, “We are planning to vaccinate on priority a certain set of people who are in touch with multiple citizens. We are working on various options for the same and also deliberating on the age group for the same. For now, the vaccination drive for 30+ will continue in the city.”

Earlier, a week ago the BMC had also decided to vaccinate all the staff of restaurants in the city, however, now the scope of the vaccination has been expanded to multiple categories.

To give a boost to the vaccination drive in the city, the BMC will double the doses supplied to each vaccination centre in the city from the current 100 doses to 200-300, depending on demand and usage.

The BMC said the supply in June from the central government is better than that of May, which saw a major fall when compared to April. The increased supply will, however, be valid for civic and government centres. For private hospitals, BMC will act as an aggregator for vaccine procurement.

Dr Gomare added, “For now, we got supply of above 100,000 doses say three days back and also on Sunday we got around 100,000 doses. Hence, the supply is sufficient to have the vaccination drive ongoing.”

Suresh Kakani, additional municipal commissioner of the BMC said, “We are now giving 300 vaccine doses to each centre, considering the scope of vaccination has also increased now. Our priority will be to administer maximum doses on a daily basis.”

As of now, the vaccination remains on Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday and on appointment basis between Thursday and Saturday, while vaccination remains shut on Sunday.

Meanwhile, as of Saturday, 4,462,767 citizens have been vaccinated in the city. Of these, 1,063,792 are in age group of 18 to 44, 1,375,665 are above 45 to 59 years, 1,336,547 1 above 60 years, 3,089 are lactating mothers, 3901 are those students wanting to go abroad for further studies, and the rest are healthcare and frontline workers.