After nat’l landmark, Delhi to touch 20mn vax doses today | Latest News Delhi - Hindustan Times
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After nat’l landmark, Delhi to touch 20mn vax doses today

, Hindustan Times, New Delhi
Oct 23, 2021 04:40 AM IST

Delhi has an adult population of around 15 million, according to January 2021 electoral data.

The national capital is on the cusp of administering 20 million jabs of the Covid-19 vaccine to its residents, according to government data, an important landmark for the city in its fight to overcome the pandemic, even as daily vaccinations have slowed down over the past month.

Of the total shots administered in the city, over 5.7 million have taken the first jab of the shot, and 7.1 million have been fully vaccinated.(Waldo Swiegers / BLOOMBERG)
Of the total shots administered in the city, over 5.7 million have taken the first jab of the shot, and 7.1 million have been fully vaccinated.(Waldo Swiegers / BLOOMBERG)

As of 10pm on Friday, according the Centre’s CoWIN dashboard, Delhi had administered 19,972,789 jabs to its residents, just 27,211 doses short of the 20-million mark, a difference the city is likely to cover on Saturday.

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Of the three Saturdays this month so far, the city administered 137,466 shots on the first (October 2), 154,364 on the second (October 9) and 112,435 on the third (October 16), and if the trends continue, Delhi will on Saturday become the 18th state or Union Territory to surpass the 20-million figure for Covid-19 jabs.

Of the total shots administered in the city, over 5.7 million have taken the first jab of the shot, and 7.1 million have been fully vaccinated.

Delhi has an adult population of around 15 million, according to January 2021 electoral data.

This means that 38.2% of the city’s adults have been partially vaccinated, while another 47.1% have received both shots. The national average for both these statistics is 44.1% and 31.8% respectively.

The landmark figure for Delhi will come two days after the country completed administering the billionth vaccine dose on Thursday morning, just over nine months after the country began a massive inoculation programme to protect all its adults against Covid-19.

In a statement, chief minister Arvind Kejriwal’s office said on Friday evening said, “As a responsible and sensitive, the Kejriwal government rapidly working on vaccinating the entire population of Delhi and will leave no one behind in this drive. The Delhi government is about to touch the two-crore [20 million] mark thanks to our highly motivated front line workers and our rigorous infrastructure, which helped accelerate our efforts even when we had low vaccine stocks.”

However, despite hovering close to the 20 million milestone, Delhi’s vaccination rate has dropped through October, which is particularly evident against a substantial spike in the pace of shots administered through September. The seven-day average of daily jabs in Delhi touched a peak of 166,545 for the week-ending September 26, has dropped nearly 55% in the past week

To be sure, Delhi is not an outlying region to have witnessed such a drop – it is visible at the national level as well. The seven-day average of daily vaccinations in India, which touched a peak of 9.7 million for the week ending September 23, has dropped nearly 60% in the past week.

The Capital has so far in October handed out 2,093,202 doses of Covishield, Covaxin or Sputnik V – the three shots currently on offer across the country, at a monthly average of just over 95,000 shots a day.

This vaccination rate is a sharp drop from the 4,360,224 jabs in September that came at an average of over 145,000 doses every day.

However, the Covid-19 infection numbers in Delhi continue to persist at record lows, levels not seen since late-March last year, which was just weeks after the pathogen set foot in the Capital.

The city added an average of 27 cases each day over the past seven days, a sharp fall from the average of 25,294 cases it added in the seven days ending April 23. Delhi endured its most brutal wave of Covid-19 between April and May this year.

“For a city like Delhi, we can say the pace of vaccination has been satisfactory,” said Dr Randeep Guleria, director, All India Institute of Medical Sciences, Delhi

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