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Rains slow down Tamil Nadu vaccination campaign
On Sunday, Tamil Nadu vaccinated around 1.58 million people, surpassing the 305,000 vaccinations recorded on Saturday.
Amid heavy rainfall across the state, vaccination against Covid-19 has taken a huge blow as officials expected to compensate during the 8th mega vaccination drive with 50,000 camps on Sunday for 12-hours.
On Sunday, Tamil Nadu vaccinated around 1.58 million people, surpassing the 305,000 vaccinations recorded on Saturday.
In at least 15 districts, people didn’t turn up for vaccination due to heavy rainfall, health minister M Subramanian told reporters. “But our staff has been going door-to-door to bring people to the camps today,” he said. “Though Covid-19 cases have reduced for us across the globe like the US and Russia the cases are still rising. So vaccination is the only solution.”
In Tamil Nadu, 72% have been vaccinated with the first dose, he said. The district of Thiruvallur has topped the state average with 75% receiving the first dose.
Health secretary J Radhakrishnan urged all those who have not taken the first dose and those who are due for the second dose to make use of the drive. “At least 1.61 crore people are eligible to take the first dose and 71.15 lakh people are due or overdue for the second dose,” he said.
Till Sunday, Tamil Nadu had about 7.1 million vaccines in stock for the drive. Two heavy spells of rains since November 6 had battered Chennai, its adjoining regions and delta districts, due to which vaccinations numbers had dropped. In Chennai, the drive was conducted at about 2,000 vaccination sites and chief minister M K Stalin inspected a medical camp in Villivakkam.
Earlier this week, M Subramanian had said that the state government aims at vaccinating 100% of the population with at least one dose before the end of November. The state has planned three more weekend camps for November.
On Sunday, 805 people tested positive for Covid-19 and 11 people succumbed to the virus. Chennai reported the highest number of new cases of 128 while Coimbatore reported 125 cases.
