The rush for Covid vaccines, which had eased a bit after the Centre increased the gap between the two doses of Covishield, has multiplied manifold as thousands of people who were made to wait for 84 days are now desperate for the second jab.
Many private vaccination centres are witnessing a huge jump in the turnout and most of the people queuing up are waiting for the second dose, officials said.
At most private hospitals on Wednesday, people had to wait for two to three hours to get vaccinated because of long queues. Some hospitals said they had to turn away many prospective recipients because the infrastructure was not adequate to handle the sudden surge.
Promila Ghosh, from Howrah, had to wait for nearly two hours for her second dose at Belle Vue Clinic. “The wait for the first shot was much less,” her son-in-law Pallab Biswas said.
Bondel Gate resident Shyamaji Kumar Mishra had to wait for more than two hours on Wednesday at the same hospital for his second jab. “I had to wait for 45 minutes for the first dose. The crowd was much less then,” said Mishra.
The Centre had on April 1 opened vaccination for everyone above 45. In Calcutta, most private hospitals were administering Covishield doses because of easier availability.
Of those who took their first dose of Covishield on or after April 1, many have their second dose schedule coming up.
The Narendra Modi government has changed the gap between two doses of Covishield twice. First, the gap was mandated at four weeks. Then it was increased to six to eight weeks. On May 12, the gap was again increased to 12 to 16 weeks following a recommendation from a government panel.
Many had wondered whether the new norms were in line with international protocols or whether the announcement by the National Technical Advisory Group on Immunisation (NTAGI) was made in view of the nationwide shortage of Covid vaccine doses.
The NTAGI had not suggested any change to the dosage interval of Covaxin.
A problem that had been pushed back has now come back to haunt.
The desperation for a quick second dose for those who have already completed 84 days stems from recent doubts expressed by a section of scientists about the long gap between the two doses.
The Modi government’s decision to set 16 weeks as the limit for the gap between the two doses of Covishield “lacked scientific basis”, multiple medical experts have said.
The Centre insisted that the decision to increase the gap was based on scientific evidence but allegedly relied on studies that had resear-ched the impact on efficacy for up to 12 weeks, not 16.
“Earlier, when the gap between two Covishield doses was six to eight weeks, many people would have taken their second doses after 45 days and the crowd would have been lesser. But, since the gap was increased to at least 84 days, more people got clustered in one large group and they are coming together. That is leading to lengthening of queues and longer waiting period,” said Sudipta Mitra, the chief executive of Peerless Hospital.
The hospital had 220 recipients of Covishield on June 17 and most of those were between 18 and 44 years, waiting for their first dose. On June 28, it had recorded 550 recipients. On Wednesday, there were 513 in the queue.
Mitra said the hospital had to turn away 50 people daily on an average because of crowding.
A Kasba resident and his wife had gone to Peerless Hospital last Monday for their second dose. “I arrived at the hospital around 2pm and left around 4.30pm. There were hundreds of people in the queue and many of them were shouting at officials because they had to wait for hours,” said the man, who had taken his first dose on April 2.
Mitra said the hospital had been starting the day’s vaccination programme at 8am, instead of 9am, which was the norm before. “From next week, we’ll open three more counters. Now there are only two,” he said.
The scene was similar at Belle Vue Clinic on Wednesday. The hospital is conducting it’s vaccination drive at the adjoining La Martiniere campus.
“A month back, we were vaccinating around 700 people a day, when there was a rush for the first dose among people between 18 and 44 years. The rush came down over the past month and the vaccine footfall had reduced to around 330,” said Pradip Tondon, the CEO of Belle Vue. On Wednesday, the count shot up to 485. Around 90 per cent of the recipients had turned up for the second dose, said Tondon.
At the RN Tagore International Institute of Cardiac Sciences, around 800 people were being vaccinated daily for the past month. Over the last five days, the number has crossed thousand.
“We were having barely 30 people taking the second dose of Covishield. Over the past five days, the number has been more than 200,” said R. Venkatesh, regional director, east, Narayana Health, which runs the RN Tagore hospital.
The hospital has three sites. When the turnout had come down, it was using one-and-a-half sites. “Now all three will be needed as the crowd is building up,” Venkatesh said.