A massive pan-India inoculation drive against COVID-19 was set in process on Tuesday with more than 56 lakh doses of the Covishield vaccine flown to 13 cities across India from Pune and taken to designated national and state-level stores amid tight security.
'What proportion of the people require the vaccine for us to manage this entire COVID-19 situation?'
'This is a tragedy that must be stopped.'
Cautioning that the country is passing through a phase when there are festivals and potential gatherings, he said this is a critical phase as the virus can spread again.
The end-to-end exercise was undertaken in Krishna district of Andhra Pradesh, Rajkot and Gandhinagar of Gujarat, Ludhiana and Shaheed Bhagat Singh Nagar of Punjab, and Sonitpur and Nalbari districts of Assam on Monday and Tuesday.
Several companies and technology heavyweights including Microsoft, Oracle and Salesforce are working to create a digital vaccination passport or health passport app in the hope that governments and airlines will require travellers to upload details of their Covid-19 tests and immunisation. The vaccine passport will effectively create digital credentials that could be the key to attending crowded events or even visiting countries.
'We need to prove to the world that quality vaccines and R&D are possible in India.'
The idea is to make unexceptionable broad promises so as to have the maximum freedom to devise policies if and when the opportunity arises, says Subir Roy.
India has purchased 500 million doses of the Oxford University-AstraZeneca vaccine candidate, one billion from the United States company Novavax and 100 million doses of the Sputnik V candidate from Russia's Gamaleya Research Institute, according to the US-based Duke University Global Health Innovation Center.
As many as 721,469 appointments were made through the national booking service on Friday -- the day of the announcement -- at an average of more than eight every second. To cope with demand, the NHS said it is using stadiums and football grounds as giant vaccination centres.
The UK government has ordered 100 million doses of the Oxford vaccine once it is ready for rollout and the doses are being manufactured before it has been shown to be successful in order to save time once it clears all the regulatory stages.
"We know that post the COVID-19 infection, immunity is only for a short duration of 3-6 months, after which the same person is vulnerable to getting reinfected. The reinfection will depend on the viral load to which the susceptible person is exposed to. We have seen some Chief Ministers and national leaders also getting infected a second time. So nobody is permanently immune," Prof. Murthy said.
A total of 3,006 session sites across all states and union territories will be virtually connected during the launch at 10.30 am by Prime Minister Narendra Modi and around 100 beneficiaries will be vaccinated at each session site.
After healthcare and frontline workers, priority will be given to those above 50 years of age and the under-50 population groups with co-morbidities numbering around 27 crore, it added.
'There is more likelihood of dying from lightning than from vaccine induced blood clots.'
The Pfizer vaccine has already been approved for the public in the United Kingdom and, Canada.
'We are already exhausted, but we can't give up.' 'The battle is still on.' 'We will see some respite by December 2021.'
Technology can certainly gain India membership in the comity of modern nations in the 21st century.
'You have sufficient protection if you take the second dose of the Covishield vaccine at 12 weeks, because this vaccine works in a way where it provides protection in the first dose.'
'We must not compromise with the standard, the quality. We don't need to be the first to launch a drug but what we need is a Made in India vaccine that the entire world can rely on'
Loud applause and cheers rang out as the first jabs were administered to frontline workers at hospitals and healthcare centres across the country on Saturday at the start of the gargantuan COVID-19 vaccination exercise, hailed as a 'momentous' occasion in India's fight against the pandemic.
Bharat Biotech started work on developing a vaccine against Zika way back in 2014.
'Prevention plus vaccination is what is going to take us into better territory by September or October.'
Each 'adarsh village' should have piped drinking water, connectivity to the main road, electricity supply to all households, library, telecom and broadband connectivity including CCTVs in public areas. Emphasis will also be on e-governance, says Sheela Bhatt/Rediff.com.
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