As the registration for vaccination of teenagers aged between 15 and 18 began on Saturday, the State government is gearing up to vaccinate at least 25 lakh beneficiaries in the week beginning January 3. The government plans to reach out to the eligible beneficiaries and administer the vaccine to them at their doorstep.
Health and Family Welfare Department Commissioner Katamneni Bhaskar said that in line with the guidelines issued by the Central government, the Health Department had made necessary arrangements to administer the vaccine against COVID to teenagers from January 3.
He said over 40 lakh doses of Covaxin were available in the State and all the 19 lakh ANMs in the State would be roped in to reach out to the beneficiaries and administer vaccine dose at their doorstep. He said all the arrangements to reach out to 25 lakh teenagers had been made.
Mr. Bhaskar said that booster doses for senior citizens with comorbidities and health and frontline workers would be given from January 10. He said there were over 14 lakh such beneficiaries in the State.
Mr. Bhaskar said that so far 40,000 persons from various foreign countries came to the State in recent times and 16,000 persons of them from vulnerable countries were tested.
He said the whereabouts of the foreign returnees who arrived at airports in neighbouring States were being collected and tests would be conducted on them soon.
He said that the impact of the Omicron variant of the coronavirus on the body was lesser compared to the previous variants of the virus and COVID appropriate behaviour was key to keep the virus at bay.
