VISAKHAPATNAM: Andhra Pradesh has crossed the two crore Covid-19 vaccination milestone on Monday. By doing so, Andhra Pradesh has emerged as the 10th state in the country to achieve such a feat to join major states like Uttar Pradesh, Maharashtra, Madhya Pradesh, etc.
The state inoculated 1.56 crore people with at least one dose, while about 49.5 lakh people were fully immunised against the novel coronavirus disease. The state took 191 days to reach the milestone after it had rolled out the mass inoculation drive for the health care workers in the first phase on January 16.
In fact, Andhra Pradesh is one of the four states to defy the gender divide by giving the jabs to more women than their male counterparts. Of the 2.05 crore cumulative doses administered as of 7 pm on Monday in Andhra Pradesh, women have got 1.12 crore doses. Due to various reasons, the contribution of private hospitals in the Covid-19 vaccination drive is very marginal in Andhra Pradesh. Even though the Union government allocated 35 lakh doses to the private hospitals since May, the consumption is limited to some 5 lakh doses at these private centres.
Vaccine wastage in AP falls to negative levels
In a special vaccination drive conducted across the state on Monday, the health department inoculated about 11 lakh people as of 7 pm. The state recently started vaccinating teachers, aged between 18 and 45, to pave the way for reopening of educational institutions in the second half of August. The state is currently not vaccinating the youngas it wants to complete vaccination for people aged 45 and above first.
Speaking to TOI, director of public health, Dr T Geetha Prasadini, said that Andhra Pradesh is vaccinating the priority groups first who are believed to be more exposed to the novel coronavirus. “We have recently rolled out the vaccination drive for teachers. Similarly, mothers having kids aged less than five were added to the priority group. People living in orphanages and old-age homes have also been vaccinated,” said Dr Geetha Prasidini.
Andhra Pradesh witnessed about 11% Covid-19 vaccine wastage in the initial days of the vaccine rollout in March, leading vaccine wastage in the country. But the wastage has now dropped to minus levels, which means that the state has administered more doses than what it received from the manufacturers.
