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PMC to source vaccines directly from Serum for universal vax drive: mayor Mohol; centres run out of stock on Tuesday
On Tuesday, Pune’s vaccination drive saw a dip in the number of eligible beneficiaries who got the jab, as many centres ran out of vaccine stock
On Tuesday, Pune’s vaccination drive saw a dip in the number of eligible beneficiaries who got the jab, as many centres ran out of vaccine stock.
Pune got its last supply of doses, 35,000, on Sunday, and has been awaiting fresh supply since.
Pune Mayor Murlidhar Mohol tweeted saying that the Pune Municipal Corporation (PMC), would try to get direct supply from the Serum Institute of India (SII), to ensure that the universal vaccination programme to start from May 1 for all aged above 18 years, could go on smoothly.
Mohol tweeted on Tuesday: “The corona vaccine will be available in the open market from May 1. Against the backdrop of this decision of the Central Government, we are trying to procure the vaccine directly on behalf of the Pune Municipal Corporation. The CEO of Serum Adar Poonawalla will be contacted and clarification will come soon. If the vaccine becomes available from Serum, it will help the people of Pune to get vaccinated faster.”
On Tuesday, during a video conference, state officials informed all the district administrations that starting from May 1, private hospitals would not be able to procure vaccines from the state. A senior official who attended the conference said, “The state has said that the entire stock which will be available with the state will be only supplied to government hospitals and not private hospitals. All aged above 18 years to 44 years, would have to approach private hospitals. That age group will not be able to register appointments with government hospital in Pune. The private hospitals will decide the price while the government hospitals would be reserved for those aged above 45 years.”
On Tuesday, state health minister Rajesh Tope also announced that SII has promised to provide the required stock to Maharashtra only after May 20.
Since May 1 the central government has allowed the states to vaccinate all above the age of 18 years, however, the state government has expressed that this would mean 120 million more people are added to the eligibility criteria and that the state would need 240 million doses, at least, for these many people.
However, SII, located in Pune, has a manufacturing capacity of six million every month and all the states and other countries and multiple multinational organisations are in the queue to procure vaccines from SII, which is mass producing Covishield.
As of Tuesday, Pune is still vaccinating using the doses it got on Sunday. On Tuesday, 24,720 beneficiaries got the jab ,including health care workers (853), frontline workers (1,693), senior citizens (13,109) and those above 45 (9,065).
However, many centres had to be shut as no vaccines were available. A senior PMC immunisation official said, “We are still using the doses we received on Sunday and we have not got any message regarding when we will get the next stock. We get the doses only an hour before, which also creates problems when we want to create sessions in advance.”
On Monday a total of 185 vaccination centres were operational. However, on Tuesday, only 134 were operational.
