Chief Minister Y.S. Jagan Mohan Reddy has directed the officials of the Health, Medical and Family Welfare Department to start COVID vaccination in urban areas from March 29 following the completion of civic polls, and to take up the inoculation drive in the villages for four days a week on a pilot basis limiting their number to two villages in each mandal per day.
The target should be to complete vaccination for one crore population in the next four to five weeks, he said during a review meeting on Wednesday.
Mr. Jagan said six days were left in the MPTC and ZPTC election process and if it was wound up, the government could concentrate on vaccination, and ordered that the vaccination drive should be carried out in villages with the involvement of village and ward secretariats, volunteers and ASHA workers.
He emphasised the village doctor concept and directed the authorities to implement it at the earliest while ensuring there was no shortage of doctors in the PHCs.
Vaccination
Officials told the Chief Minister that 3.97 lakh health and frontline workers and 59.08 lakh people aged above 60 or 45 and having co-morbidities were yet to be vaccinated, and took to his notice the Central government’s decision to provide the vaccine to all those over the age of 45 from April 1.
Mr. Jagan said COVID testing should be done in RTPCR method and all existing COVID treatment facilities should be continued.
Officials said 5,000 beds were ready at present and additional beds would be made available depending on the requirement with the focus on regions where the number of cases is on the ascent.
Deputy Chief Minister and Minister for Medical and Health Alla Kali Krishna Srinivas, Chief Adviser to the Chief Minister Nilam Sawhney, Principal Secretaries Anil Kumar Singhal (Health) and M. Ravichandra (COVID Management and Vaccination) and Commissioner of Health Katamaneni Bhaskar were were present.
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