INDORE: Active involvement of local working transgenders has helped mobilise the third-gender for Covid-19 vaccinations through special camps. The community members also helped health department in creating awareness among the masses.
Transgenders failed to get vaccine shots due to either lack of identity cards or fear of abuse from the people during regular sessions.
“Most of the transgender people are left by their families at an early age, leaving them to fend on their own for the survival. They don’t have any documented proof of their birth or identity,” said Sandhya Gharvi, one of the working transgenders who works with a local NGO.
The vaccine required registration through an identity card on Cowin portal, rendering several transgenders helpless.
In May, Gharvi and a group of fellow activists from a welfare society working for transgender put forth a demand for setting up of special camp for them, requiring no identity card for vaccination. The administration accepted the demand.
District immunisation officer Dr Tarun Gupta said “Around half a dozen camps were set up in locations of deras - living areas of Transgenders, in Khajrana for working transgenders to inoculate around 700 people of the community.”
Buoyed by the response, the transgenders also lent a helping hand to the health department in creating awareness about vaccines among the masses, Gupta said.
Community member Noorie Khan, who used to go on a rickshaw with a loudspeaker from street to street to make people aware of the importance of vaccines, said they received grand welcome from poorer localities, when the group of transgenders went to door-to-door to educate them about vaccines.
The district has so far achieved around 82% of the first dose inoculation to its eligible 28 lakh population along with around 19% have completed the vaccination with two doses, showed records.
