COVID In Odisha: 53 Lakh People Fully Vaccinated, Total Coverage To Be Completed By December

Bhubaneswar: The state government targets to complete COVID vaccination drive by December this year.

Speaking to media persons on Tuesday, Director, Health and Family Welfare department, Bijay Panigrahi said if the government will have adequate stock of the COVID vaccines, the administration of two doses would be completed in four months.

As many as 2.20 crore doses of vaccines have been administered to beneficiaries during the drive that was launched on January 16. While the first dose has been administered to 1.66 crore people, 53 lakh have availed both doses in the state. The vaccinated people included over one lakh pregnant women.

Speaking on infection among children, the director said around 8% of children were infected in the first wave and 10% in the second wave of the pandemic.

On the stock of the vaccines, Panigrahi said the state now has 28.54 lakh doses of Covishield and 4.54 lakh of Covaxin. the vaccination process is underway at over 1400 centres.

On the new variant C-1.2, he said there is no detailed information about it. But the experts are of the view that it may damage the antibody developed by the vaccine and infect a person. However, no cases of C-1.2 have been detected in the country so far, he added.