PremiumNew Delhi: The access to Covid-19 vaccines should be ensured speedily, considering the geographical span and diversity of India, Prime Minister Narendra Modi directed officials of Union Health Ministry on Saturday. He was reviewing the Covid-19 pandemic situation in the country and the preparedness of vaccine delivery, distribution, and administration.
While the total tally of covid-19 cases and death toll surged to 74,34,630 and 1,134,89 respectively on Saturday, the Prime Minister noted the steady decline in the daily Covid cases and growth rate.
Three vaccines are in advanced stages of development in India, out of which two are in Phase II and one is in Phase-III. Indian scientists and research tare collaborating and strengthening the research capacities in neighbouring countries such as Afghanistan, Bhutan, Bangladesh, Maldives, Mauritius, Nepal and Sri Lanka.
There are further requests from Bangladesh, Myanmar, Qatar and Bhutan for clinical trials in their countries.
In an effort to help the global community, Modi said, “We should not limit our efforts to our immediate neighbourhood but also reach out to the entire world in providing vaccines, medicines and IT platforms for vaccine delivery system."
National Expert Group on Vaccine Administration for Covid-19 (NEGVAC) in consultation with State Governments and all relevant stakeholders have prepared and presented a detailed blueprint of vaccine storage, distribution, and administration. The Expert Group in consultation with the states is working actively on vaccine prioritization and distribution of vaccine.
“Every step in the logistics, delivery, and administration should be put in place rigorously. It must include advanced planning of cold storage chains, distribution network, monitoring mechanism, advance assessment, and preparation of ancillary equipment required, such as vails, syringes etc," said the Prime Minister.
“We should make use of experience of successful conduct of elections and disaster management. In the similar manner vaccine delivery and administration systems should be put in place," he said adding that this should involve the participation of States / UTs / District Level functionaries, civil society organisations, volunteers, citizens, and experts from all necessary domains. The entire process should have a strong IT backbone and the system should be designed in such a manner so as to have a lasting value to our healthcare system.
Two panIndia studies on the Genome of SARSCoV-2 (Covid-19 virus) in India conducted by ICMR and D/o Bio-Technology (DBT) suggest that the virus is genetically stable and there is no major mutation in the virus.
The Prime Minister however, cautioned against complacency at the decline and keeping up efforts to contain the pandemic. He emphasised and appealed to continue social distancing, Covid appropriate behaviour such as wearing the mask, regularly washing hands and sanitation etc. especially in the wake of upcoming festival season.
The meeting was attended by Union Health Minister, Harsh Vardhan, Principal Secretary to PM, Member (Health) NITI Aayog, Principal Scientific Advisor, Senior Scientists, officers of PMO, and other Departments of Government of India.
Meanwhile, the active caseload of the country has fallen below 8 lakh for the first time after one and a half months, the government said.
The total positive cases of the country on Saturday were 7,95,087. They comprise merely 10.70% of the total cases. The active caseload was below the 8L mark (7,85,996) last on 1st September.
Around 62,212 new confirmed cases were recorded in the last 24 hours. At least 79% of these are from 10 States and UTs. Maharashtra is still reporting a very high number of new cases with more than 11,000 cases followed by Karnataka and Kerala with more than 7,000 cases each, the union health ministry said. At least 837 case fatalities have been reported in the past 24 hours. Of these, nearly 82% are concentrated in ten States/UTs. Maharashtra has reported the maximum single day deaths (306 deaths), the government said.
