59% People In Odisha Yet To Get Covid Booster Dose

Bhubaneswar: Roughly 59 percent of the eligible people are yet to receive the booster dose of the coronavirus vaccines in Odisha and the state government has urged the Centre to supply the shots to expedite the vaccination drive, an official said.

Meanwhile, Odisha Chief Minister Naveen Patnaik is scheduled to hold a review meeting of the state’s coronavirus situation on Tuesday.

Odisha Family and Welfare Director Bijay Panigrahi on Tuesday said that there is no state-sponsored vaccination drive after November 28 in Odisha. However, inoculation is underway in private hospitals.

The Odisha government has written a letter to the Centre seeking Covid vaccines to start inoculation drives again on December 23, he said.

Health Secretary Shalini Pandit said that the number of new Covid-19 cases in the state is around 10 per day for the past two months.

Meanwhile, School and Mass Education Minister SR Dash appealed to the students to use masks and maintain social distancing in classes.

Though the use of masks is not made mandatory now, the minister said it is better to protect oneself from the infection as Omicron sub-variant BF.7 has created havoc in certain countries.

It came to the fore on December 21 that one case of BF.7, apparently the strain driving China’s current surge of covid cases, has been detected in Odisha.