On Day 1 of 'Tika Utsav', states complain of Covid-19 vaccine shortage

In places such as Nainital and Tehri Garhwal in Uttarakhand, Rajsamand and Pratapgarh in Rajasthan, Sitara and Panvel in Maharashtra and Morena in Madhya Pradesh, the drive had to be stopped midway as centres ran out of stock, officials said.

The mass Covid-19 vaccination drive termed as ‘Tika Utsav’ by Prime Minister Narendra Modi began across the country on Sunday even as several states complained of shortage of vaccines.

A woman poses for photographs after receiving a dose of Covid-19 vaccine. during the vaccination festival 'Tika Utsav', at SDMC Urban Public Health Centre Daryaganj, in New Delhi. (PTI)

The ‘Tika Utsav’ comes at a time when India’s Covid-19 tally climbed to 13,525,348 while the death toll increased to 169,275 with 839 daily new fatalities, the highest since October 18, 2020, according to HT’s Covid-19 dashboard.

In places such as Nainital and Tehri Garhwal in Uttarakhand, Rajsamand and Pratapgarh in Rajasthan, Sitara and Panvel in Maharashtra and Morena in Madhya Pradesh, the drive had to be stopped midway as centres ran out of stock, officials said.

Shortages were also reported from other places such Punjab, Uttar Pradesh, Jharkhand and Bihar, forcing state governments to scale down their daily vaccination targets.

Several chief ministers -- Rajasthan’s Ashok Gehlot, Maharashtra’s Uddhav Thackeray, Delhi’s Arvind Kejriwal and Punjab’s Amarinder Singh informed the Centre about the vaccine shortages and sought immediate replenishment of stocks to meet new targets set by the Central government.

“The Government of India has assured to send four lakh doses by Sunday night but that will be sufficient only for a day. The chief minister has demanded for 30 lakh doses and also wrote to the prime minister in this regard on Thursday,” said a senior Rajasthan government official, who was not willing to be quoted.

A Punjab health department official, requesting anonymity, said lesser number of people were vaccinated on Sunday due to the shortage.

In Uttarakhand, due to shortage of vaccine doses, Sunday witnessed less vaccination sessions with 519 vaccination sessions which was 178 less than the sessions done on Friday.

As many as 900 vaccination sites in Odisha were shut on Sunday due to vaccine shortage, state health officials said.

Bihar vaccinated 206,354 people on the opening day of the four-day ‘Tika Utsav’ on Sunday, amid reports of shortage of Covaxin, which was lower than Saturday’s inoculated of 206,354 people. State’s director of family welfare, Bijay Panigrahi, said, while vaccination is underway in 579 out of over 1,400 centres in the state, the inoculation programme may have to be stopped in many places on Monday, if fresh vaccine stock does not arrive. “We will know the actual position only after completion of vaccination work in the evening. I think the entire stock will be exhausted by today,” Panigrahi said.Till Saturday, the state had 233,658 doses of Covishield and 77,960 doses of Covaxin vaccines.

On Friday, several states warned that they would run out of vaccines in the next few days, prompting Union health minister Harsh Vardhan to reiterate that there was no shortage and the country has more than 43 million doses in stock or in the pipeline. To be sure, the problem seems to be more a result of last-mile allocation of vaccines within states, since, at the aggregate level, all of them have at least as many doses as they administer in a couple of days.

Modi, during the CMs’ meet , said vaccines will have to be prioritised due to limited supply and lamented that some people were playing politics on the issue. “Those who have the habit of doing politics, let them do so. I have faced much criticism, but we remain committed to serving the people,” he said.

(With inputs from state bureaus and agencies)