Though no vaccine in India against Covid-19 has yet received emergency use authorisation, the Centre is at the last stage of the preparation for vaccine administration. Dry run for vaccine administration will be conducted in Andhra Pradesh, Assam, Gujarat and Punjab starting from next week, the government said. The dry run exercise will enable the government to understand if there is any gap in the entire process. “This will exercise enable end-to-end mobilisation and testing of Covid-19 vaccination process (except the vaccine) and check the usage of Co-WIN,” the government said. Co-WIN is the mobile application through the entire process will be monitored online.
In Punjab, the dry run will be conducted in the districts of Ludhiana and Shaheed Bhagat Singh Nagar.
The Drugs Controller General of India is currently reviewing the applications of Bharat Biotech, Serum Institue and Pfizer — the three vaccine-makers that have sought the nod for emergency use. The nod is likely to come by December. Vaccination is likely to start from January.
Getting vaccinated for Covid-19 will be voluntary, the Union Health Ministry has said though it will be advisable to receive a complete schedule of the anti-coronavirus vaccine. In the first phase, healthcare workers, frontline workers, people above 50 and people below 50 but with co-morbidities will be vaccinated.