BHOPAL: Over 23.5 lakh Covid vaccines doses were administered in Madhya Pradesh on Wednesday – at a speed of 2,000 jabs a minute -- on the first day of the mega campaign. It’s the biggest single-day score for the state, shooting past the nearly 17 lakh doses of June 21.
Both the first and second doses were administered at over 10,000 centres across the state, with special emphasis on getting people who had missed their second dose. As per the health bulletin, Indore topped with 1.12 lakh doses, followed by Ujjain at 1.11 lakh and Dewas at 69,316 doses. State capital Bhopal could manage 62,058 doses, well short of the target of 1.11 lakh at 10pm.
The target was 20 lakh for the day, which was crossed by late afternoon. At least 1.25 lakh doses were administered every hour, which peaked to 2.77 lakh between 4pm and 5pm.
Seeing the surge, orders went out to continue with the vaccination till the evening. “The figures could be a bit higher as in some remote areas, the data entry of those vaccinated is still going on,” state vaccination officer, Dr Santosh Shukla told TOI.
Chief minister Shivraj Singh Chouhan, who had told officials on Tuesday to go door to door to bring those unvaccinated to the vac centres, cheered the health workers when the 20-lakh mark was crossed.
With the constant support of Narendra Modi ji and health minister Mansukh Mandviya, we have achieved this milestone. I thank the citizens of the state for their determination,” he tweeted. When it crossed 22 lakh, he tweeted: “I salute your enthusiasm and determination.”
However, the big numbers came in the wake of a significant dip in vaccination in the previous week – a trend seen ahead of the June 21 campaign too. This time, there was a 35% drop in vaccinations over the previous weekly average. The government went all out on Wednesday.
“More than 100 ‘teeka express’ vehicles were run all over the state. They are used to gather people for vaccination, and once that is done, mobile teams rush to the spot to give them the injections. This has worked very well for us,” Dr Santosh Shukla told TOI.
