Even as COVID-19 cases continue to soar here, booster doses against the virus got off to a start on Monday.
As many as 4.78 lakh beneficiaries have been identified for administering the precautionary dose in Mysuru district. About 1.99 lakh persons are eligible in Mysuru city alone for the dose which is being administered to persons above 60 years, healthcare and frontline workers.
District Health Officer K.H. Prasad said persons completing nine months from the second dose (39 weeks) are eligible for it. The vaccine will be the same as was administered during the first and second doses, he added.
Officials from the Department of Health and Family Welfare have identified 4,78,972 beneficiaries and the taluk-wise list is – Mysuru rural 41,237, Mysuru urban 1,99,034, T. Narsipur 40,087, Nanjangud 53,547, Hunsur 39,302, H.D. Kote 37,067, Periyapatna 33,717 and K.R. Nagar 34,981.
The staff from the departments of health, rural development and panchayat raj and urban development department, who are among those identified as frontline workers, will be getting the booster dose.
The drive at Mysore Medical College and Research Institute (MMCRI) was launched at the Platinum Jubilee auditorium in J.K. Grounds here where the healthcare staff and senior citizens got the jabs.
Registration is available in CoWIN portal like it was done earlier for the first and second doses. The vaccination is registered only if the beneficiaries are eligible on completing nine months from the date of administration of the second dose.
The eligible population can also walk into the vaccination centre for the jab in case of completing both doses of vaccine and nine months after the second dose, the health officials said.
The booster dose drive was also launched in Chamarajnagar by Deputy Commissioner Charulatha Somal. As many as 6,000 persons got it on day one of the drive. The district has achieved 97 per cent target in administering the vaccines. As directed by the government, nearly 1,600 tests are being done daily. Out of 10 lakh population, 8,23,474 persons were identified in the district for immunisation.
Alert in Mysuru
After a three-digit surge in cases in Mysuru, an alert has been sounded with the district administration stepping up measures for combating the pandemic like it did in the first and second waves. Mysuru was a COVID-19 hotspot in the previous waves and all necessary precautions are being taken to contain the spread in the third wave. Deputy Commissioner Bagadi Gautham recently visited the KSOU Academic Building near Mysuru airport that functioned as the major COVID-19 Care Centre in the last two waves. It handled several hundreds of COVID-19 patients as it had about 650-plus beds. It housed over 800 patients at one time when the cases spiked significantly. Mysuru reported a single-day spike of 3,000-plus cases in the last wave.
