Odisha: Only less than half Covid-19 vaccination centres could be operated with current stock, says state official

Odisha state health minister N K Das on Thursday wrote to the Centre asking for at least 2.5 million more doses of the vaccine.

Odisha’s Covid-19 vaccination in-charge Bijay Panigrahi on Friday said that the state is running short of vaccines and with the current stock, only less than half of the total vaccination centres in the state could be operated. “We are running short of vaccines. We don’t have enough stock to run all 1,500 vaccination sites across Odisha. With this stock, only 700 vaccination sites are possible to operate,” news agency ANI quoted Panigrahi as saying.

Data from the Union health ministry showed that 4,685,831 doses of the vaccine have been administered in Odisha till 7am on Friday. (AFP)

Panigrahi’s comments came a day after the state health minister N K Das on Thursday wrote to the Centre asking for at least 2.5 million more doses of the vaccine. He also said that the state is prepared to deliver 300,000 doses a day but only 200,000-300,000 vaccines are allocated at a time.

“I again request you to urgently supply at least 10 days’ of Covishield (25 lakh doses) in a single lot as an emergency measure to enable us to plan sessions and undertake the vaccination programme effectively,” news agency PTI quoted from Das’ letter to the Centre. He also said that 5,079,650 doses of the Covid-19 vaccine have been received by Odisha till April 14.

Earlier on April 10, Panigrahi said that the vaccine stock of the state will last only for the next two days. “We have 3.2 lakh doses of Covishield and 1 lakh doses of Covaxin in Odisha. With this stock, we can continue vaccination for two days. We expect to receive vaccines from the government within two days,” ANI quoted him as saying.

In the past few days, many states like Punjab, Madhya Pradesh, Rajasthan and Kerala have requested the Centre for more vaccine doses, citing a shortage of stocks. However, the Union health ministry has denied any shortage of vaccines in the country and called the allegations “utterly baseless.”

Since the beginning of the second wave of the pandemic, Odisha has been reporting an increase in its daily infections. The state reported 3,108 new cases of the coronavirus infection and three fatalities on Thursday which took the cases tally to 361,450 and the death toll to and 1,638, ANI reported.

As control measures, a night curfew between 9pm and 5am from April 16 has been imposed in the urban areas in 20 districts in the state. A weekend lockdown has also been imposed in 10 districts bordering Chhattisgarh.

The state government on Thursday suspended class 10 and 12 board exams in the state due to the surge in infection.

Meanwhile, data from the Union health ministry showed that 4,685,831 doses of the vaccine, comprising 4,121,043 first doses and 564,788 second doses, have been administered in the state till 7am on Friday.