Children With Comorbidities To Be Given Vaccine On Priority, Says COVID Panel Chief

New Delhi: A comprehensive policy will be chalked out next week on additional COVID vaccine doses for immunocompromised people, India’s COVID Task Force chairman, NK Arora was quoted as saying by NDTV.

According to Arora, the National Technical Advisory Group on Immunisation will formulate the policy besides another one on vaccinating the country’s 44 crore children. He said that the prioritisation process is in progress, so children with comorbidities are given the vaccine first.

Arora said that a booster means 94 crore doses “which itself cannot be done overnight” when asked about a booster dose of the vaccine for the elderly.

Arora, however, asserted that there is no shortage of doses in the country, pointing out that even now, 12 to 15 crore Indians have not received a single dose of vaccine and 30 crore people have not received their second doses.

“We are waiting for the next two weeks or so where labs across the country, some of which are our own labs are working on the effectiveness of the immune response elicited by our current vaccines, Covaxin, Covishield and other vaccines with the (new variant) of the virus and what extent of the virus neutralisation takes place,” Arora was quoted as saying by NDTV.

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