9.06 mn doses of Covid-19 vaccines given to health staff take India to 3rd spot

India has been the fastest country in the world to cross all milestones ranging from 1 million to 7 million total vaccinations so far.

Updated on: Feb 18, 2021, 24:42:38 IST

By Shishir Gupta

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The Principal Secretary to the Prime Minister, Dr. P K Mishra on Wednesday chaired a high-level meeting to review the progress of the nationwide Covid-19 vaccination drive and chalk out measures to expedite the pace of vaccination.

Nearly 68.3 per cent of all healthcare workers have been administered the first dose of the Covid-19 vaccine while 37.6 per cent of eligible healthcare workers have been administered the second dose. (ANI PHOTO).

The Cabinet Secretary, Secretary (Health), Secretary (Pharmaceuticals) and CEO (National Health Authority) were also present during the comprehensive review meet. The massive Covid-19 vaccination drive in the country was launched by Prime Minister Narendra Modi on January 16.

Dr. Mishra was informed about the progress of the vaccination exercise. Till about 3.00 pm on Wednesday, the vaccination coverage in India had crossed 9.06 million doses, given mainly to healthcare workers and frontline workers. With this total number, India now ranks third globally after the United States (55.2 million doses) and the United Kingdom (16.12 million doses) — among nations that have completed more than 60 days of vaccination as compared to 31 days in the case of India.

India has been the fastest country in the world to cross all milestones ranging from 1 million to 7 million total vaccinations so far.

Nearly 68.3 per cent of all healthcare workers have been administered the first dose of the Covid-19 vaccine, 37.6 per cent of eligible healthcare workers have been administered the second dose, 28.2 per cent of all frontline workers have been administered the first dose as well.

The Principal Secretary was also informed that India has supplied Covid-19 vaccines to 13 countries as grants through the Ministry of External Affairs (MEA). Bangladesh, Myanmar, Bhutan, the Maldives, Nepal, Mauritius, Seychelles, Sri Lanka, Bahrain, Oman, Afghanistan, Barbados and the Dominican Republic are some of the countries which have received supplies of vaccines from India. In addition, the vaccine has also been sent to 14 countries (Bangladesh, Myanmar, Morocco, Brazil, Egypt, Algeria, South Africa, Kuwait, UAE, Saudi Arabia, Mexico, Dominican Republic, Saudi Arabia and El-Salvador) under commercial contracts.

It was also discussed at the meeting that the version 2.0 of the Co-Win digital app for self-registration of vaccine beneficiaries is ready and would be launched soon. Plans to involve private sector healthcare facilities in a significant manner in the ongoing vaccination drive were also discussed. This will enable registration of the population in the 50 years+ category for the Covid-19 inoculation drive, which is the third population priority group after healthcare workers. Plans to involve private sector healthcare facilities in the ongoing vaccination drive were also mulled.

ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Shishir Gupta
Shishir Gupta is Executive Editor at Hindustan Times and one of India's top journalists covering national security, strategic affairs, foreign policy and geopolitics. Over the past three decades, he has extensively reported on India's military, diplomatic and security landscape, covering every major conflict and national security challenge, from the 1999 Kargil War and the 2020 East Ladakh standoff to Operation Sindoor in 2025. He has also covered major terror attacks, including the IC-814 hijacking, the 26/11 Mumbai attacks and the 2025 Pahalgam terror strike, along with numerous Pakistan-backed terrorist incidents in the Kashmir Valley and across India. He has reported on national and state elections for more than three decades. A recognised authority on strategic affairs, Gupta has covered India's nuclear programme since the Pokhran-II (Shakti series) tests in May 1998 and has written extensively on global nuclear issues, Indian diplomacy and the country's expanding global outreach. He has also reported widely on international conflicts and terrorism, with a special focus on the Indian subcontinent. Gupta has interviewed Prime Minister Narendra Modi more than four times, including Modi's first interview with the print media after becoming Prime Minister in May 2014. His other interviews include three with the Dalai Lama, as well as conversations with Benjamin Netanyahu, Amit Shah, Yogi Adityanath, S. Jaishankar, Nirmala Sitharaman and Piyush Goyal. He is the author of Indian Mujahideen: The Enemy Within (Hachette, 2011) and Himalayan Face-off: Chinese Assertion and Indian Riposte (Hachette, 2014). He was awarded the Chevening-Wolfson Joint Scholarship at Wolfson College, University of Cambridge, UK, in 1998 and participated in the International Visitor Leadership Program (IVLP) of the US State Department in 2006. He received the Ben Gurion Prize from Israel in 2011 and the K. Subrahmanyam Prize for Strategic Studies in 2015 from the Manohar Parrikar Institute for Defence Studies and Analyses (MP-IDSA). Since 2024, he has hosted Point Blank, Hindustan Times' weekly YouTube show on global geopolitics.Read More

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