Apollo Hospitals Enterprises on Wednesday said it plans to launch a private market for vaccines against Covid-19 within weeks across the country, a move that may help in making India achieve its August target, Bloomberg reported.
In an interview with Bloomberg Television, the health care chain’s Managing Director Suneeta Reddy said they are working with the Centre to provide vaccines for health workers, and has also trained 6,000 people besides allocating 3,500 inoculation sites.
“Our expectation is maybe March. We have the advantage of so much of the manufacturing happening in India, so there will be vaccinations available unlike in a lot of other countries. There is great potential to cover many more people,” Reddy said.
Eleven states have inoculated less than half their healthcare workers with Covid-19 vaccines, according to Union health ministry data released on Tuesday that underline the challenge ahead to meet the deadline a week away.
India has inoculated over 6.1 million healthcare workers, about 61 per cent of nearly 10 million nationwide due to receive the vaccines, since the vaccination campaign began on January 16, but the states lagging are causing concern among health officials.
The health ministry has set a February 24 deadline for healthcare workers to receive first doses of the vaccines and plans to start the campaign to inoculate people above the age of 50 years in March.
Over 2.4 million, or about 26 per cent, of around 20 million frontline workers across the country have also received the first doses of the vaccines. Eight states have already vaccinated 40 per cent or more of their frontline workers, but 10 states have covered less than 10 per cent.
However, at this rate, India will fall short of its target to inoculate 300 million people by August, Bloomberg reports.
“I believe it's achievable, but I do believe public and private have to work together. We can exceed those numbers -- if we do achieve these vaccination goals, India will be well prepared for the second wave,” Reddy said.
