KOLKATA: Witnessing a sharp drop in the number of second dose recipients at the civic vaccination clinics, the Kolkata Municipal Corporation has decided to launch an awareness drive particularly in areas where the second dose recipients are yet to turn up.
According to an internal vaccine data recorded by the KMC clinics across Kolkata, the civic body is in search of 21% of the recipients who had taken their first shot from the civic vaccination clinics but didn’t turn up for their second dose. When the KMC medical officers at the clinics first noticed such mismatch, they formed a team of honorary health workers in August and sent them from door-to-door of select neighbourhoods to woo the recipients of second dose to be present at the civic clinics. The initiative yielded results as 1.5 lakh recipients finally took their second dose from over 50 vaccination clinics.
According to a KMC health department official, the allocation of Covishield vaccine for each civic clinic was sufficient for inoculation of second dose recipients across 144 wards and the recipients should take the opportunity at the earliest. “The supply of vaccines has been steady and sufficient for the past two months. This is the right time the recipients should respond to our appeal and queue up at our clinics to get inoculated till the stocks last,” said a KMC medical officer.
Records with some KMC clinics in areas like Tollygunge, Jadavpur, Behala, Kidderpore, Metiabruz and EM Bypass reveal a poor attendance of second dose recipients in the past few weeks. For instance, several clinics in Tollygunge recorded a 50% attendance of second dose recipients. “We were given 200 doses today. At the end of vaccination hours we recorded presence of 90 second dose recipients and 10 first dose recipients,” said a medical officer at a KMC clinic in Tollygunge.
Atin Ghosh, a member in KMC Board of Administrators overseeing the health department, said: “Now, even senior citizens can take the opportunity of avoiding crowd and take second shot at our clinics.”
