New Delhi, (Samajweekly) Three weeks into the Covid immunisation drive, Delhi started to vaccinate its frontline workers on a pilot basis since Thursday at select vaccination centres to test the process before rolling it out full scale from Saturday, officials said.
“The frontline workers were permitted from Thursday, on a pilot basis on some select vaccination booths in each district, as from Saturday, the vaccination of the frontline workers will start on full scale,” a senior government official told IANS.
The official also said that the pilot run went smooth and no discrepancy has been found in the mechanism so far.
However, the other details related to vaccination are yet to be known from the government. There is no clarity on whether all the vaccination centres would be directed to inoculate frontline workers or only a chunk will be allowed.
The pilot run of Covid-19 vaccination for frontline workers including civil defence staff and municipal workers started on Thursday.
There are a total of six lakh frontline workers in the national capital of which around 3.5 lakh frontline workers have been registered for the vaccine shots while over 90,000 healthcare workers have been vaccinated so far.
Dr Ajeet Jain, Medical Superintendent of the Delhi government-run Rajiv Gandhi Super Speciality Hospital (RGSSH), said that the frontline workers have been queuing up for the last two days. “We have vaccinated 10 per cent extra of the target both on Thursday and Friday,” he told IANS.
Dr Pragya Shukla, nodal officer of the vaccine centre at the Delhi State Cancer Institute (DSCI), said that the hospital vaccinated 160 people which include healthcare and frontline workers on Friday.
However, they did not reveal the figures of frontline workers who received the jabs. “We have not prepared a separate list for now since there was no direction from the government,” said Dr Chhavi Gupta, media spokesperson of RGSSH.
