Odisha To Receive 2.5 Lakh Doses Of COVID Vaccine Today; Drive To Be Hampered For 2 Days!

Bhubaneswar: Odisha will be receiving 2.5 lakh doses of COVID-19 vaccine on Saturday as against the demand for 25 lakh doses for uninterrupted inoculation drive.

The state has a stock of around 1.26 lakh doses of Covishield and 92,000 doses of Covaxin. “It will take at least a day to dispatch the doses to the districts once the consignment arrives at the state vaccine centre, which means the ongoing drive will be hampered for next two day,” Director (Family Welfare) Dr Bijay Panigrahy told the media.

Odisha saw another 292 sessions sites being shut on Friday due to shortage of vaccines while 670 and 692 centres were closed on Thursday and Wednesday respectively.

Two lakh doses were administered on Friday after the arrival of 3.5 lakh doses of Covishield vaccine on Tuesday.

The Odisha government has shot off another letter to the Centre, seeking 25 lakh doses of Covishield to make ‘Tika Utsav’ successful.

Prime Minister Narendra Modi had appealed to the chief ministers of all states and union territories to organise a vaccine festival to inoculate as many people as possible against the coronavirus from April 11 to April 14.

Meanwhile, the Health & Family Welfare Department on Saturday tweeted about more than 40 lakh doses of the COVID-19 vaccine have been administered in Odisha in 70 days

While the first 10 lakh doses were administered in 45 days, the second 10 lakh doses in 11 days, the third 10 lakh doses in eight days and the fourth 10 lakh doses in six days, the department added.

The vaccination drive started on January 16.