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Assam authorities worried at lukewarm response to second Covid vaccine dose
On Tuesday, health minister Keshab Mahanta appealed to those persons who are due to get their second dose of either Covishield of Covaxin to come forward and get vaccinated
Health authorities in Assam are worried at the lukewarm response by a section of the public towards the second dose of Covid-19 vaccine.
On Tuesday, health minister Keshab Mahanta appealed to those persons who are due to get their second dose of either Covishield of Covaxin to come forward and get vaccinated.
“We have tried a lot to bring those people to vaccination centres. We have telephoned them, set up call centres in each district. But still a lot of people whose second doses are due are not turning up. I don’t know why,” he said.
“Some of them may have got their second doses elsewhere and we might not be aware of it. I would appeal to media outlets to urge people to come and get their doses,” added Mahanta.
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The minister said that while 51% of all eligible persons above 18 years had got their first doses, only 11% of beneficiaries had taken their second doses. Both numbers, however, are higher than the national figures of 32% of total eligible beneficiaries administered with the first dose and 9% with second dose.
Till Thursday morning, 14.98 million doses of Covid-19 vaccine had been administered in the state. Of them, 12.36 million people had taken their first doses, while 2.61 million people were fully vaccinated or had their second doses.
Mahanta informed that nearly 250,000 to 300,000 doses of vaccines are being administered daily in the state at present and there is adequate supply to vaccinate all eligible persons.
According to director, health services (family welfare) Munindra Nath Ngatey, over 270,000 persons who had got their first dose are scheduled to get their second dose in the next few days.
As per existing guidelines, those given Covishield have to take their second dose between 84 and 112 days after taking the first dose. On the other hand, the gap between first and second dose of Covaxin is 28 days.
“If the gap exceeds 112 days, it is considered overdue. It is possible that sometimes people might forget when the date of their second dose is due,” said S Lakshmanan, director, National Health Mission (NHM), Assam.
According to union health ministry guidelines, persons who get infected with Covid-19 after taking their first dose can take the second dose three months after recovering from symptoms of the disease.
“There could be some persons infected with Covid-19 after their first doses, but the number of such beneficiaries is very less and not a cause of concern,” said Lakshmanan.
In order to encourage more people to get both their first and second doses, the health department is conducting awareness drives in all districts. Officials are using electoral rolls to find out if all beneficiaries above 18 years have turned up for their vaccine doses.
Door to door campaigns to vaccinate all eligible persons have also started in some parts of Kamrup (metropolitan) district, which includes Guwahati. At present there are nearly 2,000 vaccination centres across the state.
As per health officials, Assam has an eligible population of 23.7 million who are above 18 years of age.
