Mumbai: As per Union Health Minister Mansukh Mandaviya, India’s cumulative Covid-19 vaccination has crossed 99 crore today.
Taking to Twitter, he said, “We are at 99 crores. Go for it India, continue to rapidly march towards our milestone of 100 crore #COVID19 vaccinations.”
India’s COVID-19 vaccination drive commenced on January 16, 2021. Initially, the vaccination was opened for Health Care Workers (HCWs) only.
From February 2, front line workers were made eligible for vaccination. These included State and Central Police personnel, Armed Force Personnel, Home Guards, Civil Defence & Disaster Management Volunteers, Municipal workers, Prison Staff, PRI Staff & Revenue workers involved in containment and surveillance, Railway Protection Force and election Staff.
This was expanded from March 1 to include persons above 60 years of age and those above 45 years with associated specified 20 comorbidities. This was further expanded to all people above 45 years of age from April 1. From May 1 all persons above 18 years of age were made eligible for COVID-19 vaccination.
Inoculated 1 billion or partially vaccinated?
Amid all this, the milestone masks a yawning gap between the number of people who have been fully inoculated and those that have had just one shot.
The country has only given two shots to 20 per cent of its population of about 1.4 billion, according Bloomberg’s vaccine tracker. By comparison, 51 per cent have had a single dose, making it one of the highest disparities in the world, the tracker shows. Neighboring China, the only nation to dish out more vaccine doses than India, has fully inoculated some 1.05 billion, or 75 per cent of its citizens, as of late September.
Covid-19 updates
India recorded 13,058 fresh covid cases in past 24 hours. This is the lowest rise in last eight months. 166 people have died of Covid in the last 24 hours.
The country’s active caseload (1,89,694) is 0.56 per cent of the overall cases logged since the start of the pandemic, the Health Ministry said. The active caseload is also the lowest in 221 days.
As an independent media platform, we do not take advertisements from governments and corporate houses. It is you, our readers, who have supported us on our journey to do honest and unbiased journalism. Please contribute, so that we can continue to do the same in future.
