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NEW DELHI: Sanitation worker Manish Kumar became the first person in India to be vaccinated against COVID-19 on Saturday (Jan 16), when Prime Minister Narendra Modi launched one of the world’s largest immunization campaigns to control the pandemic. Starting with two locally made shots.
India is prioritizing nurses, doctors and other front-line workers, and Modi had tears in her eyes when addressing healthcare workers via video conferencing.
“The disease separated people from their families, kept mothers away from their children, and those who died from the disease could not even get one last goodbye from their families,” Modi said.
Hymn singing in Sanskrit followed the Prime Minister’s speech. Modi, 70, has not said whether he will take the vaccine, but has said politicians would not be considered frontline workers.
Healthcare workers see Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi addressing them via video conference to launch one of the world’s largest COVID-19 vaccination campaigns at a government-run hospital in Kolkata on January 16. 2021 (Photo: Reuters / Rupak De Chowdhuri).
Kumar received his vaccine at India’s leading Institute of Medical Sciences (AIIMS), one of 3,006 vaccination centers established across the country.
On the first day of an immunization campaign that the government says is the largest in the world, India is aiming to vaccinate some 300,600 people.
“This will be the world’s largest vaccination program covering the entire country far and wide,” Modi’s office said in a statement this week.
Eswar Jani, 31, a sanitation worker, receives COVISHIELD, a COVID-19 vaccine manufactured by the Serum Institute of India, at the Mathalput Community Health Center in the remote Koraput district in the eastern state of Odisha on January 16. 2021 (Photo: Reuters / Danish Siddiqui)
India, the world’s most populous country after China, has said it may not need to vaccinate all of its 1.35 billion people to create herd immunity. Still, covering even half its population will make it one of the largest immunization programs in the world, even if countries like the United States vaccinated all residents.
However, beneficiaries will not be able to choose between the Oxford University / AstraZeneca vaccine and a government-backed, homegrown Bharat Biotech vaccine, the efficacy of which is unknown. Both are produced locally.
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India, which has reported the highest number of coronavirus infections after the United States, wants to vaccinate around 300 million people with two doses in the first six to eight months of the year.
Roughly 10.5 million people in India have been infected with the coronavirus, more than 151,000 of whom have died, although the rate of cases has dropped from a peak in mid-September.
The first to receive the vaccine will be 30 million healthcare workers and other front-line workers, such as sanitation and safety, followed by around 270 million people older than 50 years or considered high risk due to pre-existing medical conditions .
A woman stands in front of a COVID-19 vaccination center at Max Hospital in New Delhi on January 16, 2021 (Photo: Reuters / Anushree Fadnavis).
On Saturday, Modi is also expected to formally launch the government’s online platform Co-WIN that will provide information on vaccine stocks, storage temperature and track beneficiaries.
The government has already purchased 11 million doses of AstraZeneca COVISHIELD injection, produced by the Serum Institute of India, and 5.5 million COVAXIN from Bharat Biotech.
COVISHIELD is 72 percent effective, according to India’s drug regulator, while Bharat Biotech says COVAXIN late-stage trial results are expected in March.
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