Covid-19: Vaccinations in Delhi to start at 89 booths

NEW DELHI: Vaccination against Covid-19 in Delhi will start at 89 centres located in 40 government and 49 private hospitals on Saturday.
“The first batch of 254,500 doses of Covishield and 20,000 doses of Bharat Biotech’s Covaxin have reached Delhi so far,” a government official said. “More batches will follow.”

Every centre has been asked to vaccinate at least 100 people per day, the official said. The numbers will, however, depend on the vaccine availability.

Once the process to vaccinate healthcare workers and frontline workers starts, the Delhi government has asked the district magistrates to collect data about people above 50 years of age and younger ones with comorbidities.


“After this, we start with the preparations regarding data collection of people above 50 years of age,” the official said.

A prominent private healthcare provider in Delhi said the state government has alerted them to be ready for the vaccination drive starting on January 16.

“Dry runs have happened,” said another official from a private hospital. “As it involves a lot of IT infrastructure, the state government had brought their own system. They have asked us to identify people who are trained to inoculate, and space where inoculations can be given.”

Earlier, the Delhi government had asked the private hospitals to provide a list of healthcare and frontline providers to be inoculated in the first phase. “The lists of the people who qualify for the first round have been submitted to the Delhi government,” the official said.

Earlier this month, the Drug Controller General of India (DCGI) gave emergency use approval to two Covid-19 vaccines – Serum Institute of India’s Covishield and Bharat Biotech’s Covaxin.

VK Paul, member (health) at NITI Aayog, had on Tuesday said the vaccines have been tested on thousands of people and side-effects are negligible. Calling the two vaccines the “safest”, he said there was no risk of any significance.