Farmers Movement Archive

UP CM wants timelines for Covid vaccination met, but challenges remain

The Uttar Pradesh government has stepped up preparations for Covid-19 vaccination drive, however, registration of all healthcare workers, to be vaccinated in the first phase, and development of additional storage capacity in select districts, remain major challenges for authorities.As of now about 605,000 of 780,000 healthcare workers have got themselves registered at the CoWIN portal, a digital platform set up by the Union government for real-time monitoring of Covid vaccine delivery. Healthcare workers employed with the private sector are lagging behind with less than 90% having registered so far.Officials aware of the developments said, private health facilities in nearly 14 districts have not come forward with details for registration of all their healthcare workers on the CoWIN portal.“Yes, the scenario is bad in 14 districts including Lucknow, Prayagraj, Bareilly, Kanpur Nagar, Meerut, Ballia, Maharajganj, Moradabad, Chandauli, Badaun, Farrukhabad and Sambhal. Less than 90% workers of private facilities have filled up the registration details in these districts against 99% workers in government facilities. This may be because private hospitals may not be willing to show a certain category of workers as their staff,” said a senior officer on condition of anonymity. Principal secretary, medical and health, Alok Kumar, however, said all efforts were being made to ensure that most of the healthcare workers fill up the form for vaccination. “We have asked chief medical officers (CMOs) to make all out efforts to get all healthcare workers registered on the portal. We are keeping the option for registration on the portal open to get more coverage and preparations are afoot for vaccination of 8 lakh health care workers,” said Kumar. Uttar Pradesh has 5,235 government healthcare facilities, while the number of facilities in the private sector is about 21,280. Workers in 5,180 government facilities have completed the registration along with staff in 19,170 private facilities. The state has about 783,000 registered healthcare workers including 546,500 with the government centres and 237,000 with the private sector. A programme to train more than 1 lakh vaccinators has been launched and about 35,000 Covid vaccination centres are being set up in the state, said an official. He added that each team of vaccinators is expected to vaccinate 100 persons per day.Also Read: Yogi Adityanath govt coins MYK mantra to counter opposition before 2022 pollsAdditional funds of about Rs 4 crore have been made available for installing additional cold chain storage capacity in the state for about 2.5 lakh litres of vaccine. Construction or renovation work has been completed only in 26 districts so far, with another 25 districts likely to finish work by December 20.Most other districts are expected to complete the capacity installation by December 31, while Bareilly and Mirzapur are likely to complete it by January 20 and January 10, respectively. Amethi and Sitapur are among the districts, where the work on vaccine storage has not even begun. Also Read: Mayawati again seeks withdrawal of new farm lawsThe Union government is providing refrigerators and deep freezers to store the vaccine and 4.5 crore syringes have been allocated to the state for the purpose. About 1,040 deep freezers have been allotted against the requirement of 1,240. There is also a shortfall of vaccine carriers with an allotment of about 26,800 carriers against the demand for 115,635, said an official. Chief minister Yogi Adityanath on Saturday said that all timelines for the vaccination drive must be met and arrangements for the safe storage of vaccines and maintenance of the cold chain should be fool proof. He added that a police constable and a home guard will be deployed with every vaccination team. The Covid 19 vaccination drive is likely to be a major challenge for India’s most populous state and its experience of immunization programmes for polio and other diseases is likely to help. A state steering committee, headed by the chief secretary, has been coordinating with various departments and task forces headed by district magistrates in every district.

Hindustan Times

20-12-2020

Lucknow