Second Dose Of COVID Vaccine For Frontline Workers From Feb 13

New Delhi: Healthcare and other frontline workers will be administered the second dose of COVID-19 vaccine from February 13.

“Only the first dose of vaccine has been given to them so far… The second dose will be administered to healthcare workers from 13th February,” NITI Aayog member Dr VK Paul said at a press conference on Thursday.

Touted as the world’s largest vaccination programme, it was launched on January 16. Serum Institute of India’s Covishield and Bharat Biotech’s Covaxin are being used as government regulator Drugs Controller General of India has approved these two only thus far.

As per official record, 45,93,427 beneficiaries have been vaccinated till 1.30 pm on Thursday, with India being the fastest country to reach 4 million vaccinations.

But there are as many as 11 states and union territories, including Tamil Nadu, Assam and Jammu & Kashmir, where just 30% or fewer of healthcare workers have been inoculated, informed Union Health Secretary Rajesh Bhushan.

“There is a very structured & robust system of Adverse Event Following Immunization (AEFI) monitoring in this country. It has been further strengthened in view of COVID-19 vaccination. We have 8563 AEFI so far when we have done vaccination in lakhs. This is 0.18% of vaccinated people,” informed Bhushan.

A total of 1,239 private and 5,912 public hospitals are being used as vaccination session sites across the country.