Vaccines are the best weapon to fight against this deadly virus. And I urge you all to take the vaccine whichever is available, whenever your turn comes. Our health care workers, frontline warriors are doing a phenomenal job in such adversity, we got to support them.
“१८ ते ४४ वयोगटाचं लसीकरण १ मे पासून होणार नाही”, said Rajesh Tope (Maharashtra’s Health minister). He was announcing free vaccination at Govt. hospitals in Maharashtra. He also announced that the state will not roll out vaccination for 18-44 in the state from 1st May. Many states made similar announcements. Later Maha’s CM said that the state will start vaccination from May 1st symbolically with a limited supply of vaccines, to mark the state’s formation day. Is the decision of the central govt giving the option to states to open up vaccination a logical one or just another populist decision?
The vaccination drive began in India from mid-January, a month after the US, and a month and a half after the UK. Firstly, it was opened to our health care workers, frontline warriors, then for 45+ population, and now in phase 3 starting from 1st May, 18+ population is being covered. The timing to start vaccination (mid-January) was fair enough in my opinion. But the pace at which it is going is a matter of concern. Literally, there was a holiday for vaccination on 2-3 occasions. This is not a job to take holiday from. Three and half months into vaccination, still a daily average of vaccines administered is a little over 3 million which is phenomenal but do keep in mind that we have 1.4 billion people to vaccinate. For the last couple of days (1st-3rd May) daily vaccines administered are below 2 million which is a horrible number. Maharashtra is vaccinating less than 1 lakh people a day during the above period. A well-to-do state is in such a crisis I don’t want to comment about other states.
Now on to the supply side of the table, India is the vaccine capital of the world. Two out of every three children have got at least one vaccine produced in India especially by Serum Institute of India, Pune. With Serum at our disposal, India seemed very confident about vaccine rollout. India had resources but it lacked proactiveness. On one hand, the USA, Canada, UK were securing enough jabs to vaccinate their population three-four times with contracts placed in August-September 2020. India placed its first order in January 2021. Till the start of May, 26 crore doses are ordered. With phase 3, the vaccination program becomes even more cluttered. Ideally, Govt should’ve rolled out phase 3 a little earlier with a little more help from the center as states are suffering to secure enough doses to vaccinate all of their adult population. There couldn’t have been worse timing.
But in all this we still have hope. Humanity has been successful in containing deadly diseases like Polio & AIDS over the years. It will require global support & co-operation. India should’ve focussed more on vaccinating through contact tracing or mass vaccination of population that actually needs to go out and work (18-45 years of age) rather than 45+. Contact tracing vaccination contributed immensely to conquering Polio. With more and more no. of vaccines, more global co-operation, and more focus on vaccinating the correct demography, we will defeat this virus. And India will shine even more as “Vaccine capital of World”.
Sarthak's Musings 