New Delhi, June 1: India will have enough COVID-19 vaccine doses to inoculate up to one crore people per day by mid-July or early August, the government asserted on Tuesday as it underlined that there is no shortage of jabs and called for patience citing the country’s large population.
Noting that the ferocious second wave is on the verge of abating, the government said that ramping up of testing as well as containment at the district level “has worked” in bringing down the cases.
At the same time, it cautioned that while the easing of lockdown is imperative, it has to be done very slowly. “Whatever we know from possible scenarios presented by eminent people, it (COVID) will decline and June will be much much more better but the concerns are when we open up how do we behave because the virus has not gone anywhere,” NITI Aayog member (Health) V K Paul said.
Addressing a press conference, ICMR Director General Dr Balram Bhargava said India’s vaccination is being ramped up and “by December we hope to have the whole country vaccinated”.
He mentioned that India is one of the five countries which are producing vaccines and asserted that “there is no shortage of vaccines”.
“Shortage is what you feel if you want to vaccinate the country within a month. The total number of vaccinations done in the country is nearly equivalent to the total number done in the United States and our population is four times the population of the USA. We have to have some patience. “By mid-of year, mid-July or early August, we will have more than enough doses to vaccinate up to a crore per day,” he said.
Joint Secretary in Health Ministry Lav Agarwal said 4,03,49,830 vaccine doses were supplied from the Centre to states free of cost in May while 2,66,50,500 doses were directly procured by states and 1,24,54,760 doses were directly procured by private hospitals.
In the past month, a total of 7,94,55,090 doses were available, of which 6,10,57,003 doses have been administered.
The cumulative number of COVID-19 vaccine doses administered in the country has reached 21,60,46,638, according to the ministry data updated this morning. (PTI)
