Around 65,000 healthcare workers to be vaccinated initially
No Corona casualty in UT after 7 months
Sanjeev Pargal/
Fayaz Bukhari
JAMMU/SRINAGAR, Jan 13: Jammu and Kashmir today received first batch of 1,46,500 doses of COVID-19 vaccine Covishield and the Health and Medical Education Department will initiate major exercise tomorrow to deliver it at all districts within the next two days as vaccination will start from January 16 after its launch by Prime Minister Narendra Modi countrywide and Lieutenant Governor Manoj Sinha at the Government Medical College (GMC) Jammu.
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Along with vaccine, J&K also had another good news today as it didn’t report any COVID casualty for the first time in last seven months. The UT, however, reported 121 positive cases-66 in Kashmir and 55 in Jammu region. It was on June 12, 2020 that no Corona fatality was reported in J&K and since then no day has passed without a virus death.
Out of a total of 1,46,500 doses of vaccine, Kashmir has received 79,000 and Jammu 67,500.
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Jammu and Kashmir has received Oxford-AstraZeneca’s Covishield vaccine in the initial phase and could get Bharat Biotech’s Covaxin later.
Director Health Services Kashmir Dr Samir Mattoo and Dr Qazi Haroon, State Immunization Officer received the vaccine at Divisional Vaccine Store at Barzulla, Srinagar in Kashmir while Dr Renu Sharma, Director Health Services Jammu and Director Family Welfare J&K accepted the consignment in Jammu.
Dr Renu Sharma told the Excelsior that they have called ‘Vaccine Vans’ from all districts of the Jammu region to collect the vaccine tomorrow.
“All 10 districts of the Jammu region will be allotted doses of vaccine based on registration of health workers, who will be vaccinated initially,” Dr Sharma said.
She added that along with healthcare workers of the UT Government, the same staff of Central Government and Armed Forces will also get vaccine.
Of 67,500 vaccine doses received in Jammu, 34,000 will be reserved for the same healthcare workers who will get the first dose beginning January 16 to ensure that they get the second dose after 28 days. With 10 percent wastage, around 30,000 healthcare workers are likely to be vaccinated from the Covishield doses received today in Jammu region and nearly 35,000 in Kashmir. So far, 1.07 lakh healthcare workers have been registered for vaccination across the UT and number is likely to go up.
As reported, Prime Minister Narendra Modi will launch vaccination driver countrywide on January 16. In Jammu and Kashmir, Lieutenant Governor Manoj Sinha will kick off the drive from the Government Medical College Jammu.
On Day 1, the vaccine will be administered to healthcare workers at 27 designated sites. One hundred persons will be vaccinated at each site which means 2700 persons will get first dose of vaccine on January 16.
Atal Dulloo, Financial Commissioner, Health and Medical Education said that the vaccine will be sent to all the districts and immunization points across J&K. He informed that the vaccines will be ferried to far flung areas which are cut off due to heavy snowfall with the help of choppers, so that all the healthcare workers are vaccinated even in the most difficult and inaccessible areas of J&K.
Dr Qazi Haroon, State Immunization Officer told Excelsior that around afternoon, Kashmir received its consignment of 79, 000 doses of vaccine to be used in the Phase-1 of the vaccination drive.
The vaccine has been kept in storage in Kashmir at the Divisional Vaccination storage centre in walking coolers as well as in ILRs. On Thursday morning, Dr Qazi said, the distribution will start on a war footing.
He said that taking the vaccine to its respective vaccination sites will be entirely completed in one day and the same will be taken to the far off places that are cut-off due to snow and other reason with the help of choppers.
In Kashmir, there are around 60,000 healthcare workers who will be vaccinated in the process as the vaccine rollout begins from January 16.
In Phase-2, the frontline workers which include police personnel, paramilitary personnel and the municipality workers are set to be vaccinated. In Phase 3, the population above 50 is to be vaccinated and those less than 50 years and in Phase 4, the rest of the population will be vaccinated.
Notably, the Government has already identified PHCs, Sub Centres, SDHs and DHs as vaccination sites across J&K and the vaccinators, as well as the rest of the assisting staff, has been trained through the dry runs that were earlier carried across the UT.
Meanwhile, 66 persons tested positive in Kashmir for COVID-19 today.
Those who tested positive include 35 from Srinagar, 8 Baramulla, 7 Budgam, 5 Pulwama, 3 Kupwara, 2 Bandipora, 5 Ganderbal and one from Shopian.
With fresh positive cases the total number of positive cases in Kashmir division have reached to 71,952 including 69,936 recoveries and 1,200 deaths.
The officials said that total number of active cases in Jammu and Kashmir are 1,629 including 816 from Kashmir division.
With 174 more recoveries, the tally of total recoveries in Jammu and Kashmir has reached 119,344 which is 97.10 percent of the total cases.
In Jammu region, 55 persons today tested positive for COVID-19 including 47 in Jammu district while 77 others recovered from the virus, 57 of them in Jammu district alone.
Corona fatality toll in the Jammu region stayed at 712.
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