Union health minister Mansukh Mandaviya informed the Rajya Sabha on Monday that over half of the country’s population has been fully vaccinated against coronavirus. Mandaviya said it was a big challenge to vaccinate 130 crore people in the country if we compare to other countries with lesser population.
“Still, due to the efforts of our health workers, 88% of the first dose and 58% of the second dose have been taken in the country,” the health minister said.
The minister was addressing the lawmakers in the Upper House regarding the Covid-19 situation arising due to the Omicron (B.1.1.529) variant in the country. He also said states and Union territories have sufficient doses of vaccine available with them and the production capacity in the country would be ramped up in the next two months
“Today all states and UTs have adequate quantities of vaccines, 17 crore doses are available with them. Our manufacturing capacity has increased. Today India has the capacity to manufacture 31 crore doses of vaccine every month. In the next 2 months, it will further rise to 45 crore doses per month,” the minister said. Briefing on the Omicron variant, the minister noted that 161 confirmed cases have been identified so far from across the country.
“We are monitoring the situation daily with experts. With our experience during the first and second waves (of Covid-19), to ensure that we do not face problems when variant spreads, we have arranged a buffer stock of important medicines,” he said.
“To protect against Omicron, we have issued SOP (standard operating procedures) for travellers coming from abroad. I myself also interacted with the states, we are constantly assessing this variant with the expert team,” he added.
With the administration of 15,82,079 vaccine doses in the last 24 hours, India’s COVID-19 vaccination coverage has exceeded 137.67 Cr (1,37,67,20,359) as per provisional reports till 7 am today. This has been achieved through 1,44,91,123 sessions.