India's COVID vaccine drive reaches 25 lakh beneficiaries; 6 states under 20% turnout

The Union Health Ministry said on Thursday that at least 25,07,556 beneficiaries have been vaccinated for COVID-19 till 2 pm all over India. Union Health Secretary Rajesh Bhushan informed that there is an increase in the number of vaccination sessions per day and also mentioned that said India was the fastest to reach the first 1 million vaccinations. He said, "On January 16 when vaccination session started, 3,374 sessions were organized which has increased to 7,764 sessions on January 26. By January 16, over two lakh beneficiaries were vaccinated, but today, the number of beneficiaries has crossed 25 lakhs."

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COVID-19 cases declining 

Bhushan further stated that there are currently 1,75,000 active cases in the country. "Number of active cases are declining, there are 1,75,000 active cases in the country as of now - a steady and declining trend is being exhibited. Two states still have 40,000 or more active cases - Kerala with 72,000 active cases and Maharashtra with 44,000 active cases," he said. 

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Low turnout for vaccination 

As per reports, nearly six states have less than 20% of their healthcare workers who have been vaccinated against Covid-19 as of now. Other than the national capital Delhi, the states with low coronavirus vaccination rates till now are Jharkhand, Tamil Nadu, Uttarakhand, Chhattisgarh, and Maharashtra.

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On January 16,  Prime Minister Narendra Modi had launched the pan-India rollout of the COVID-19 vaccination drive through video conferencing. He said that a vaccination drive on such scale and scope has never been conducted in history. "Normally, it takes many years to make a vaccine but in such a short span of time, not one, but two 'Made in India' vaccines are ready. Meanwhile, the work on other vaccines is progressing at a fast pace. This is a living example of India's capability and talent. India's vaccination programme is based on a very important principle that those who are in need of the vaccine will get vaccinated first. Our doctors, nurses, medical & paramedical staff, sanitation workers in hospitals - be it private or hospital are entitled to get vaccinated. This will be done on priority," the Prime Minister had said.

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The drug regulatory body of India has currently approved two vaccines. Pune-based Serum Institute of India (SII) has developed the Covishield vaccine developed by AstraZeneca and Oxford University while the Covaxin has been developed by Hyderabad's Bharat Biotech in collaboration with the Indian Medical Council of research (ICMR) and National Institute of Virology.

(With ANI Inputs)