Vaccination Centres Down By 82% In Assam Over Short Supply From Centre

Short and erratic vaccine supply by the Centre has forced the BJP-led government in Assam to cut down the number of operational vaccination centres by almost 82% from over 2,000 centres to a little over 300 on Wednesday. The supply shortage has derailed the mega vaccination drive which began across the country on June 21.

While Assam administered a record 3.74 lakh doses across over 2,000 centres to kickstart the mega vaccine drive on June 21, the number of vaccine centres have since been reduced - to just 353 on Wednesday and till 4 PM today, only about 10,000 people were inoculated.

"On June 21, when we launched the enhanced vaccination drive, the target was to inoculate about 30 lakh people in ten days if the centre sustained the vaccine supply. The plan - to vaccinated three lakh people each day - was only successful for three days but it slowly got derailed due to a shortage of vaccine supply. We have shown that we can actually vaccinate over three lakh people in a day but we need a smooth supply of vaccines for that," said a senior health department official who did not want to be named.

On June 24, Assam's daily inoculation had fallen to 1.58 lakh doses. On June 27, Assam could administer slightly above 10,000 doses.

The vaccination slowdown corresponds to an inadequate and erratic vaccine supply from the Centre.

According to the Assam Health Department data available with NDTV, before the mega drive began, Assam received 2.90 lakh doses of Covishield and 20,000 doses of Covaxin on June 19.

Again, between June 22 and June 24, the state received 6.27 lakh doses of Covishield and 29,000 doses of Covaxin.

But since then, vaccine doses have not reached the state and Assam is running the drive with whatever vaccine is in stock.

According to the government data, the state had received only over 14.2 lakh doses for the special drive between June 19 and June 24 from the Centre. The state had some doses left from a previous stock.

In the last 10 days, Assam could administer only about 16 lakh doses - one lakh above the halfway mark of its target.

The crisis is reflecting on the ground. For the past four days, Jyotirman Kalita has been looking for a vaccine for his father but with no luck.

"I am looking for a vaccine for my father who is a government employee. His office has given a circular that he should get vaccinated or his salary will be withheld. But there is no vaccine at the centres and when I ask, they say that even they do not know when it will be available," Mr Kalita told NDTV.

Assam has asked all its departments to review the status of vaccination of its frontline government employees before the salaries from the "current month onward" are disbursed.

During the first three days of the mega vaccine drive, when Assam was able to meet the target of three lakh doses a day, both Chief Minister Himanta Biswa Sarma and Health Minister Keshab Mahanta had posted about the success of the vaccination drive on social media. But now, the government has no official word on the vaccine slowdown in the state.

Assam has administered about 72.21 lakh doses so far. Only 12.20 lakh beneficiaries have been fully vaccinated with two doses.