Many states report vaccine shortage

April 9, 2021 Hot from the Oven Valli Sarvani No comments

While the biggest massive inoculation drive has been continuing in the country, many states have reported vaccine shortage. They said that they were forced to shut down many vaccination centres due to vaccine shortage.

States like Odisha, Maharashtra, Haryana, Chhattisgarh, Andhra Pradesh, and Telangana complained about running out of vaccine doses in a few days. They also said that they are not receiving enough supply.

Odisha government said that it closed 700 vaccination centres due to a lack of vaccine supplies. It said that it had vaccine supplies only for a couple of days.

In this regard, the chief minister of Odisha, Naveen Patnaik, wrote a letter to the Centre saying that Odisha had only 5.34 lakh doses of Covishield. As the government is vaccinating around 2.5 lakh people daily, it can vaccinate for two days with the current stock.

Also, out of 1400 vaccination centres, the government had to shut down 700 vaccination centres due to a shortage of vaccine supplies. The Odisha government requested the Centre to supply at least 25 lakh doses to administer the vaccine for the next 10 days without any interruption.

Some private hospitals in Ghaziabad, Uttar Pradesh, have also displayed notices stating that they have run out of vaccine supplies. Hence they cannot vaccinate people. They are saying that they have no clarity on the arrival of stock. Hence they stopped vaccination for the time being.

Similarly, Maharashtra also reported that it had vaccine stocks only for the next five days. So, the government requested the Centre to supply the vaccines immediately. Around 4.5 lakh people are getting vaccinated in the state daily and the government requested 40 lakh doses. It has been informed to get the new stock by April 15.

In Mumbai, 26 vaccination centres were closed due to out of stock. The city has 120 designated vaccination centres. The government says that vaccination would be halted for some days till they get the new stock of vaccines. However, the central government dismissed the concerns of states about the shortage of vaccine doses, saying that it sent adequate supplies to all states.

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