Health minister Mansukh Mandaviya to hold review meeting with 3 states with low first dose coverage

The union health ministry will meet with officials from Manipur, Meghalaya, Nagaland, and the union territory of Puducherry on Monday, according to news agency ANI. The virtual conference would also include Health Minister Mansukh Mandaviya and other senior ministry officials, according to the newspaper.

The minister will review the progress and planning of Covid-19 vaccination in these states and the union territory of Puducherry, where the first dose coverage is less than 70 per cent.

The first dose coverage in Meghalaya was 56.7 per cent, Manipur 54.2 per cent, Nagaland 49 per cent and Puducherry 65.7 per cent, according to government data, as reported by news agency PTI.

The meeting comes amid the government’s efforts to speed up the vaccination coverage across the country. Apart from focusing on administering the second dose to all the eligible adults, the Centre has also asked state governments to ensure all the candidates receive the first dose as well.

According to officials, over 12 crore beneficiaries are overdue for their second dose of Covid-19 vaccine after the expiry of the prescribed interval between the two jabs.

The government has launched a month-long ‘Har Ghar Dastak’ campaign for house-to-house vaccination of those who are yet to take the first dose and those whose second dose is overdue.

The Centre launched the campaign days after India achieved the milestone of administering one billion doses of the Covid-19 vaccines. The milestone was crossed on October 21, little over nine months after the nationwide vaccination programme began.

The number of doses administered in India is next only to China, which is said to have given over 2.2 billion doses to its citizens.