Covid vaccination: Special teams to jab those left out of second dose coverage

BHUBANESWAR:  As slow pace of second dose vaccination emerged as a concern amid steady rise in new cases, Odisha government has planned to deploy special vax teams in districts with less than 30 per cent vaccination coverage.

While more than 50 pc targeted population in three districts – Ganjam (72.4 pc), Khurda (71.5 pc) and Sambalpur (50.5 pc) – have been fully vaccinated, the double dose coverage in 10 districts is 24 pc to 30 pc. The Health and Family Welfare department has asked Collectors to prepare a list of vaccination centres on the basis of number of beneficiaries overdue for second dose vaccination.

Director of Family Welfare and nodal officer of Covid vaccination Dr Bijay Panigrahi said as people due for second dose are not turning up for shots despite repeated reminders, districts have been advised to form special vax teams and send them to villages for vaccination.

“Once the vaccination centre list is prepared, it will be easy to target the villages with low vaccine coverage. The vax team will visit the villages and administer the vaccine after convincing the beneficiaries. People are not coming to session sites where cases have declined or no new case is reported,” he said.

After Union Health Secretary Rajesh Bhusan on Saturday directed States to expedite second dose inoculation, the Health department has decided to review the vaccination drive twice a week in order to achieve its target of four lakh vaccination a day.  Even as both the vaccines are available plentily and session sites have been increased to over 1,800 health workers are finding it hard to achieve the target.