Complacency in taking the second dose because of reduced Covid cases has kept the number of double vaccinated population low in Bengal, health department officials and public health experts said.
Along with the complacency to get fully vaccinated, the increasing trend of dropping guard and not maintaining Covid safety protocol was also a cause of worry for health officials and experts.
State health department officials said on Wednesday that of the 7.26 crore people in Bengal eligible to get two doses of Covid vaccine, a little more than six crore have received either one or both doses. Out of these, only around 2.5 crore people have got their two doses, a senior health department official said.
Public health experts said the fear factor as a driver of the success for public health endeavour was first experienced in Covid.
“We earlier thought fear and pressure would keep people away from public health initiatives. But Covid has shown how fear has been the key factor in vaccination and maintaining safety protocol,” said Abhijit Chowdhury, a public health expert.
“There is a fresh complacency among a section of people who have taken the first dose. They feel Covid is gone. But we cannot be complacent,” said the health department official.
On Thursday, Bengal had 860 new cases with Kolkata having 233, according to the state health department..
The state government has started a drive to visit homes and find out why someone has not taken the vaccine.
Many private hospitals also said they were having people missing out on their second dose dates.
At RN Tagore International Institute of Cardiac Sciences, around 20 per cent of the second dose recipients are missing their scheduled dates.
“The Covid vaccine footfall has gone down from around 1,000 per day to about 100 everyday,” said R Venkatesh, regional director, east, of Narayana Health of which RN Tagore hospital is a flagship unit.
At Belle Vue Clinic too, around 10 per cent second dose recipients are not turning up on the due date. “We are sending messages three to four days prior to the scheduled date but still there are 10 per cent people not coming for the second dose,” said Pradip Tondon, CEO of Belle Vue.
Also, more people are dropping guard. “People are either not wearing masks or wearing those on their chins which have no effect,” said the health department official.
Another factor was the errors in registration, said officials. “So, although some have taken two doses, the data in the CoWin app is showing them as having received a single dose,” said an official.
He said once such errors were rectified, the number of second dose recipients would go up by a few lakhs.