Mumbai civic body preps to give vaccination at doorstep for the ill

The Brihanmumbai Municipal Corporation (BMC) has appealed to citizens to submit data of their family members who are bedridden due to health complications for at least six months and require Covid-19 vaccination at their doorstep

The Brihanmumbai Municipal Corporation (BMC) has appealed to citizens to submit data of their family members who are bedridden due to health complications for at least six months and require Covid-19 vaccination at their doorstep. According to BMC officials, they will just collect data for door-to-door vaccination for now, and that administration of it will start after a go-ahead from the state government.

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The Maharashtra government had informed the Bombay high court (HC) last week it would soon commence home administration of vaccines for citizens, who are immobile or bedridden, on an experimental basis, starting from Pune district. Hence, the BMC is preparing itself for the same in the coming days.

According to BMC officials, they currently do not have exact data on how many such beneficiaries will have to be given vaccine at their homes. They do have data from the ‘My Family, My Responsibility’ drive, wherein they had conducted door-to-door screening. However, health conditions do change from time to time and hence they would want citizens to submit their data, officials said. Citizens can submit the names of such family members to their local health officer in the respective ward offices. The civic body may make available an email address for the same in the coming days.

The BMC officials added that there are several challenges involved in door-to-door vaccination and it will require specific guidelines from the state health department. For example, one vial has 10 doses and after vaccinating three people at their doorstep, they need guidelines as to what has to be done with the pending seven doses. Further, BMC officials said there also needs to be guidelines on what has to be done in case of adverse effects post immunisation.

Suresh Kakani, additional municipal commissioner of the BMC, said, “Currently, we are just collecting data for door-to-door vaccination. We will start it only after a go-ahead from the state government.”

The BMC aims to vaccinate three million citizens in July. According to BMC officials, around 550,000 citizens in the 45+ age group took their first dose in April 2021 from civic centres, and assuming all these will turn back to civic centres for their second dose, the BMC will require a considerable amount of doses.

A BMC official said, “Apart from maintaining a stockpile of 550,000 vaccine doses, we also need to administer vaccines to the 18 to 44 age group and for those taking the first dose in the 45+ age group. Hence, we will require maximum vaccine doses in July, compared to the past six months.”

The BMC received a stock of 688,470 vaccine doses, up from the 523,440 in May. Further, it got 947,950 doses (the highest) in April, 810,950 doses in March, 571,000 in February and 265,000 in January.

Kakani added, “In our meetings and communication with the state government and central government, we have been asking for maximum possible doses, considering we have adopted an aggressive vaccination drive. Going by this, we would like to administer 100,000 doses daily.”

Meanwhile, the BMC has 285 vaccination centres, where it has vaccinated a record 80,000+ beneficiaries in a single day. Overall, the civic vaccination centres have administered 2,966,432 vaccine doses out of the total 5,654,345 administered cumulatively in the state and private vaccination centres.