Ladakh facing peculiar problem in absence of pvt sector
Irfan Tramboo
Srinagar, Apr 11: Despite the announcement of starting the third dose of the COVID-19 vaccine by April 10 for the 18-59 age group, the private hospitals are yet to roll out the vaccination process in J&K while Ladakh is facing a peculiar problem in starting the process as it faces the absence of the private sector.
In this regard, while the private hospitals have been directed to procure the vaccines directly from the manufacturers, the Government has kept the process of administering the precaution doses exclusively for the private healthcare institutions
Earlier, the issue was stuck with the pricing of the per vaccine dose. However, the same was then resolved after the manufacturers slashed the per-dose price to Rs 225 and a cap was put in place.
Officials told Excelsior that the private hospitals can now charge Rs 386 at max which includes the service charge of Rs 150. “The service charge can dwindle but the cap has been set as Rs 386 only and no one can charge beyond that,” the officials said.
They informed that the vaccination has not been started yet in J&K because the vaccines are not available with the private hospitals and that they are in the process of procuring the same from the manufacturers.
“They have not procured the same yet while we have asked the hospitals to contact the manufacturers and get the vaccine doses,” they said.
Officials from Ladakh told Excelsior that they do not have any private hospital in the Union Territory and that they are trying to resolve the problem by roping-in different stakeholders. “We are meeting the stakeholders and we are expecting to come up with a solution,” the officials said.
As per the officials, the vaccination process of 18-59 will be exclusively for the private hospitals while the administration of the precaution dose is going to be homologous, which means, the same vaccine type will be used for the precaution dose which was used for vaccination of 1st and 2nd dose.
Concerning the eligibility, the officials said that those who have received their second dose 9 months ago will be eligible for the third dose.
In this regard, as per the guidelines, the HCWs, FLWs and citizens aged 60 years or more, shall continue to receive precaution dose vaccination at any CVC, including free of charge vaccination at Government Vaccination Centers, features for which are already live on Co-WlN.
For the citizens in the age group of 18 to 59 years, the feature for booking of appointments and on-spot scheduling for precaution dose has also been enabled for PCVCs.
“It is not necessary to register any citizen afresh for the administration of precaution dose (and for 2nd dose). To adhere to the vaccination protocol specified by the Ministry, the vaccinator must locate the existing vaccination record of the citizen, verify the identity document, administer the dose upon successful verification and record the vaccination,” the guidelines stated.
Eligible citizens can avail of walk-in vaccination where PCVCs can add beneficiaries onsite to an ongoing vaccination session for precaution dose. “Co-WlN system shall send SMS’ to all citizens eligible for precaution dose based on the details of earlier vaccinations recorded in the Co-WlN system,” the guidelines said.
Also, it has been stated that the ongoing free vaccination program through Government Vaccination Centers for the first dose and second dose to eligible population and precaution dose to Health Care Workers, Front Line Workers and 60+ population would continue and must be accelerated.
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