Trial run of near-to-home vaccination begins in Noida, Ghaziabad

For 52-year-old Randhir Nagar of Birondi Chakrasenpur village in Dadri block, Monday was a day of celebration

For 52-year-old Randhir Nagar of Birondi Chakrasenpur village in Dadri block, Monday was a day of celebration. After a long wait he finally got his first shot of vaccination against Covid-19.

HT Image

“Right from the day when my son, daughter-in-law and grandchildren got infected in the second week of March, I had been waiting for this day. Today, I finally got the jab with my wife and children. My fear has suddenly disappeared now,” he said.

Forty-eight-year-old Murari Kishan of Bhagwantpur Chhatanga village in Jewar block, said that for the last 45 days, all the attempts of most of the villagers, to get the vaccination was futile. “Even today, we waited to book our slots till 3 pm. Suddenly, someone came and told us to reach the vaccination booth near our home. Had the administration or health department cleared our confusion on time, probably all my 200-odd villagers – eligible for vaccines could have been inoculated today. But due to confusion, only 62 of us could get our first shots,” he said.

This seemed to be the major drawback of Monday’s trial run of the “near-to-home” vaccination drive in Jewar and Dadri blocks in the Gautam Budh Nagar district.

District magistrate Suhas LY admitted as much saying that the turnout in Jewar block was only 22%. “It appears that the villagers were not informed properly about the drive. I’ve asked the health department officials to look into the shortcomings. It was better in Dadri where we vaccinated 2,700 people out of a target of 3,000,” he said.

The vaccination required no prior-booking and was a precursor to the July 1 mass vaccination drive when all districts of Uttar Pradesh would have to target 1 million vaccinations.

GB Nagar chief medical officer (CMO), Dr Deepak Ohri, said, “The trial run will continue in both these blocks till June 30. I hope from Tuesday, we’ll have good numbers.”

District immunisation officer, Dr Neeraj Tyagi said that altogether 18,958 persons got their different vaccine doses at 120 vaccination sites in the district, including 77 at government health centres. “Till the date, total vaccination doses given in the district are 1,019,694. Out of it, while 9,00833 have taken their first dose, 118,861 have taken both doses,” he said.

Ghaziabad

In Ghaziabad, the cluster vaccination drive for all adults resulted in the highest daily number of 28,001 doses at two blocks, surpassing the target of 20,000.

A major share of 10053 (35.9%) doses administered at six Covid vaccination centres (CVCs), including five in urban segments, in the clusters of Indirapuram urban centres and Bhojpur rural centres. Together, there were XXX CVCs.

The cluster at Kailash Mansarovar Bhawan administered the most doses (4272) , followed by Maharajpur and Bhojpur (1,930), Vasundhara (909), Adarsh Nagar (Khoda) (819), and Sadik Nagar (748).

“Earlier, I had tried several times to book the slots online, but I could not. This time, I got the vaccine easily,” said Nimit Tyagi, a beneficiary at Bhovapur centre under Maharajpur CVC. “However, I feel that turnout at these centres could be more if proper awareness is spread among people and prior information is provided.”

Some beneficiaries faced issues as staff at Makanpur was not familiar with the registration process.

“I got myself, my wife and my sister vaccination at the centre on Monday morning and when I checked if I could get my mother vaccinated as well, the staff said that she will have to go to a camp meant for 45+ age group category. However, when other staff arrived, they got the issue resolved and finally I took my mother to the centre for vaccination,” said Kishan Singh, another beneficiary at the centre.

Under the cluster vaccination drive from June 21 to June 30, specific areas in urban and rural segments have been identified. Teams from the health department have been assigned a cluster, having several residential wards or villages, which they will try and fully saturate with vaccination to the local population.

Ghaziabad chief medical officer Dr N K Gupta said that CVC staff will be briefed about the age criteria. “We will also seek help from local councillors and RWAs and this will help us achieve better vaccination per day,” he said.

According to the Cowin portal, the state of UP till Monday night achieved vaccination of 26304025 beneficiaries and this included 690552 doses administered on Monday.