18+ vax drive resumes in HP; daily jabs capped
Himachal Pradesh National Health Mission director Hem Raj Bairwa said instead of inoculating different age brackets in separate sessions, everybody will be administered the vaccine at common sites.
Even as the state government resumed vaccination of the 18-44 age bracket on Monday, it also capped the daily limit of jabs for each district.
Himachal Pradesh National Health Mission director Hem Raj Bairwa said instead of inoculating different age brackets in separate sessions, everybody will be administered the vaccine at common sites.
“All sessions will be created on CoWIN as regular sessions and not as “Near to Home Covid Vaccination Centres” (special session), except in tribal areas and Dodra Kawar, to ensure session visibility for the general public on the application,” he said.
The state has a stock of nearly five lakh doses and the supply of vaccines has also been smooth. On site slots will be decided by the district authority based on previous experience of session booking. For rural Covid vaccination centres, CoWIN allows to create sessions with any number of online slots. However, in urban areas at least 50% online slots have to be made available at the time of session creation. Districts may publish sessions for urban areas with minimal session capacity to limit online session booking based on previous experience and local requirements in consultation with district administration, he said.
Sessions will be published between 12pm to 1pm, at least a day prior to the session. “Session capacity and a number of sessions is to be planned as per vaccine availability. However, district-wise daily capping limit for session planning has been set considering eligible beneficiaries for the second dose and population proportion for the first dose,” he said.
Daily vaccination has been limited to 75,000 doses. Ongoing sessions will be extended to minimise vaccine wastage from the last open vial.
In urban areas, in case online slots are not taken up, on-site slots will be increased to cater to the available cohort of beneficiaries, subject to vaccine availability for that day. The inoculation drive for the 18+ age group slowed down at the end of June and was completely stopped on July 14 due to a shortage of doses.
So far, Himachal has administered around 44 lakh doses. Around 33.6 lakh people have been given the first dose, which is 62% of the total population.
Similarly, around 10 lakh people have been given the second dose as well, which is around 22% of the total population. Over 12 lakh people of 18+ category have been given the first jab and the target population is over 30 lakh.
Districts’ daily vaccination limit
Himachal has limited daily vaccination to 75,000 doses
District Daily limit
Bilaspur 4,100
Chamba 5,500
Hamirpur 4,600
Kangra 16,000
Kinnaur 1,000
Kullu 5,000
Lahaul-Spiti 400
Mandi 10,800
Shimla 9,500
Sirmaur 5,800
Solan 6,800
Una 5,500