India kick-starts the world’s biggest inoculation drive to beat Coronavirus but we must still follow the protocol

Time: A little after 11 am on Saturday. The nationwide anti-COVID vaccination drive began with a sanitation worker at Delhi’s All India Institute of Medical Sciences (AIIMS), who became the first person in the country to receive a shot. “I was not reluctant (to get the vaccine shot)... people should not be afraid,” Manish Kumar said. It was thus that nearly a year after reporting its first case of Coronavirus, India kicked off the world’s largest immunisation drive against COVID-19 when Prime Minister Narendra Modi launched the offensive at the click of a button through video conferencing. As part of its plan to bring the pandemic under control with two locally-produced vaccines, Covishield and Covaxin, the Government inoculated lakhs of healthcare and frontline workers, such as sanitation and security workers, to a collective sigh of relief that this could finally be the beginning of the end of the COVID-19 trauma. The next in line are Indians above the age of 50 or those considered as high-risk individuals due to pre-existing medical conditions. Around 100 persons received a vaccine at each of the 3,006 sites across India on the first day. As feared, there were some glitches but it’s nothing considering the vast topography of the nation. Union Health Minister Harsh Vardhan visited the vaccination sites at Sir Gangaram Hospital and AIIMS, Delhi, and described the COVID-19 vaccines as “sanjivani” in the fight against the accursed virus as he urged people not to heed hearsay and, instead, put their faith in experts and scientists. “It’s a historic day. We have been blessed by the Prime Minister all through our fight against COVID-19. It’s the largest Coronavirus vaccination programme in the world,” Vardhan said. “We have been able to put up a valiant fight against the disease during the past year. Adopting a pre-emptive and proactive strategy has resulted in a good performance. We have probably the lowest fatality rate in the world,” he said. In a message to the nation’s population, he said that nobody should indulge in spreading or believing rumours pertaining to the efficacy of either vaccine.

In the national Capital, the vaccination exercise was carried out at 81 sites across 11 districts. Six Central Government hospitals — AIIMS, Safdarjung, RML, Kalawati Saran Children Hospital and two ESI hospitals — had been chosen as sites for the drive. Besides these, Lok Nayak Jai Prakash Narayan Hospital, the Delhi Government-run GTB Hospital, Rajiv Gandhi Super Speciality Hospital, DDU Hospital, BSA Hospital, Delhi State Cancer Institute and the ILBS Hospital are among the vaccination sites. Then there are private facilities — Max Hospital, Fortis Hospital, Apollo Hospital and Sir Ganga Ram Hospital — which have also been chosen as sites for the exercise. However, many people at the RML Hospital were apprehensive, with some of them reluctant to go for the shot, and then there were others with mixed feelings. Dr Sharmila (name changed) of the hospital, who has been working in the COVID department, said: “I am scared as the vaccine’s efficacy is not yet proved but this is my best bet. It is my leap of faith…I will take the plunge. Dr (Randeep) Guleria (AIIMS director) has also taken the shot; I believe in him.” The day was also not bereft of politics — with Congress spokesperson Manish Tewari training the guns at the Government and referring to the Norway incident where 23 deaths occurred after taking the anti-COVID jab manufactured by Pfizer — but we, as a people, strongly believe that such bumps would not be able to derail the massive campaign that aims at achieving health for all its citizens.