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Each of 839 Tika Express in Bihar vaccinating 171 persons daily: Govt
A senior Bihar government officer also informed Patna high court about the steps taken to fill up vacancies in the health sector.
Bihar government told Patna high court on Tuesday that it was running 121 ‘Tika Express’ or Covid vaccination centers on wheels in urban areas of the state for the benefit of the elderly and those living in remote and inaccessible areas, and similarly, 718 ‘Tika Express’ were catering to the beneficiaries in distant and inaccessible rural areas.
Additional chief secretary, department of health, Pratyaya Amrit told the court that the vehicles deployed for ‘Tika Express’ have been outsourced for rural areas and those for urban areas have been hired by development agencies like CARE (Cooperative for Assistance and Relief Everywhere) and UNICEF (United Nations Children’s Emergency Fund).
“Approximately 200 doses are provided to each Tika Express and on an average, 171 persons are vaccinated each day by each Tika Express which has one vaccinator and one verifier,” Pratyaya Amrit informed the court.
As per the affidavit, contractual or regular ANMs (auxiliary nursing midwife) have been deputed as vaccinators on these mobile centres after training. It adds that while the verifiers for urban areas have been hired from CARE, those for rural areas are from the government.
“The government is running three 24X7 vaccination centres in Patna and 9 am to 9 pm centres in all the districts,” the state government told the court.
The senior government officer also informed the court about the steps taken to fill up vacancies in the health sector. “The counselling for filling up 2,590 posts of general medical officers and 3,706 vacant positions of specialist doctors has been completed and the appointment process is likely to be completed soon. Under the National Health Mission (NHM), 171 doctors have been recently appointed, appointment of 163 nursing tutors is being completed and the counselling for filling up 4,102 positions of general nursing and midwifery (GNM)is going on and likely to be completed soon,” he said.
The affidavit said that the state government has 1,198 ambulances to provide services across the state, while 250 more basic life support ambulances are in the pipeline to augment the referral transport capacity.
Besides, the government officer also provided details of various facilities and status of manpower, vaccination and basic infrastructure in Buxar, Aurangabad, Jamui and Bhagalpur as was sought by the court.
