An audit of the COVID-19 vaccines will be conducted in Rajasthan to ensure that the doses are not wasted.
The exercise is being undertaken following reports of alleged wastage of vaccines, though the State government has claimed that the vaccine wastage was limited to 2%, which was below the national average of 6%.
With 1.70 crore people in the State having received the vaccine doses, Rajasthan had remained a front-runner in vaccinating the beneficiaries and was among the leading States where the wastage was very low, Medical and Health Minister Raghu Sharma said here on Tuesday.
Mr. Sharma said there was zero vaccine wastage in the inoculations for the people in the age group of 18 to 44 years. “We have placed a special emphasis on the quality of vaccination processes. I have directed my department to do a thorough quality check of the vaccination being carried out in the State,” Mr. Sharma said in a letter shot off to Union Health Minister Harsh Vardhan in response to his communication asking for a probe into the issue of vaccine wastage.
The Minister termed the report cited by Dr. Vardhan as false and said the matter had been thoroughly enquired by his department’s officers, who had found it as not based on facts. “Sometimes it happens that after opening the vial, the unused doses have to be discarded due to safety concerns. It leads to some amount of wastage,” he said.
‘Wastage within limit’
The wastage rate in Rajasthan was well within the limit permitted by the Centre, said the Minister. Dr. Vardhan had cited a report of about 500 vials found in the waste bins, into which he had sought an investigation.
As part of the audit exercise, the Chief Medical and Health Officers in all districts will ensure inspection of vaccination centres once every week and pay attention to the inoculations as per the “queue dynamics”, after which the proper entries will be made in the software.
