Rajasthan: Covid vaccination drive for 18+ group likely to resume from today | Jaipur News

A nurse administers a vaccine at a health centre in the city on Tuesday.

JAIPUR: Health minister Raghu Sharma on Tuesday said vaccination for 18+ category, which had almost stopped since May 31, will restart from June 9 after receiving 12.7 lakh doses of vaccines from firms.
The health department had paid more than Rs 100 crore for the vaccines for procuring 30,57,720 lakh doses, but received 17,87,720 doses of vaccines worth Rs 60 crore so far. “Vaccines worth Rs 40 crore was yet to be supplied to the state. We are expecting the supply on June 9. After receiving, we will restart vaccinations for the 18+ category that will continue till June 21, till the Centre takes over the drive,” said Sharma.
From June 21, the state government has demanded time-bound supply of the vaccines from the Centre. “We hope the Centre will supply the vaccines in a time-bound manner as we have sufficient storage capacity,” said the minister. For the 45-plus age group, the Centre has supplied 1.83 crore doses till date, out of which 2.15 lakh have been provided to the army while 1.79 crore doses have been distributed to the districts of which 1.56 crore doses have been administered in the form of first dose and second dose to beneficiaries till date across the state. Sharma said from May 1, the state government was assigned the job to vaccinate above 18 to 44-year age category, for which the state government has paid money in advance. “We have received the doses from Serum Institute of India and Bharat Biotech but still one lot of vaccines was yet to reach the state,”said Sharma.
On the decision of the Centre providing free vaccines to the above 18+ category, Sharma said vaccination was the responsibility of the Centre. Several states had knocked on the doors of Supreme Court on the issue. “The Supreme Court has asked a serious question to the Centre about the vaccination. Amid mounting pressure from across the country, the Centre finally decided to take the responsibility of free universal vaccination,” he said.