Vaccination for 12-15 years begins after initial tech glitch

Vaccination of children against Covid-19 in the 12-15 years age group was inaugurated in a “token manner”, after initial technical glitches in Patna on Wednesday afternoon, officials said.

PATNA: Vaccination of children against Covid-19 in the 12-15 years age group was inaugurated in a “token manner”, after initial technical glitches in Patna on Wednesday afternoon, officials said.

A health worker administers a dose of Corbevax Covid-19 vaccine to a teenager in the age group of 12-15 years in Patna on Wednesday. (Santosh Kumar/HT Photo)

According to officials, 10 children were vaccinated in the capital city. The state health department, however, did not issue any vaccination bulletin, mentioning the number of children vaccinated on the opening day, saying the inauguration was “token” and it would pick-up after the Holi celebrations.

“It was a token inauguration today. We will work in close coordination with schools, most of which are closed on account of Holi. We expect the vaccination drive to take-off after the festival. We will send our team of vaccinators to schools to inoculate children,” said executive director, state health society, Bihar, Sanjay Kumar Singh, who is also the state’s nodal officer for Covid-19 vaccination.

Earlier in the day, people had to wait for vaccination due to some glitches in the CoWIN portal, which did not allow pre-booking.

“The CoWIN portal did not show the option of 12-15 years age group initially in the morning. It was, however, set right by 12:45pm and by 1 pm we had begun vaccinating children of those who came to our centre as walk-in beneficiaries,” said Care India’s Mansoon Mohanty, the centre in charge of Gurunanak Bhawan vaccination centre, which was one of the two centres for vaccination of children of this age group.

Bihar has a target population of 84 lakh children in the 12-15 years age group of which 2,95,166 are in Patna.

“From tomorrow, we will have vaccination sites for children at all our 66 permanent session sites, including 40 urban centres, 23 primary and community health centres, and three sub-division hospitals,” said Dr SP Vinayak, district immunisation officer, Patna.

He said the state capital presently had 2.48 lakh doses of Corbevax vaccine, allowed to children for the 12-15 years age group. As many as 56 lakh doses of the Covid-19 vaccine are available in the state.