A single dose of Covid vaccine is 96.6 per cent effective in preventing death and two Covid shots 97.5 per cent effective in checking fatality, the Health Ministry said on Thursday underscoring the need for vaccination of every individual in the country.
Presently, 58 per cent of the country’s adult population have received at least one dose of coronavirus vaccine, while 18 per cent have got both the shots, the total number of jabs administered in India has crossed 72 crore.
“The vaccines are disease-modifying in that they prevent serious disease and death. They are not disease-preventing,” Balram Bhargava, director general, Indian Council of Medical Research said at a Press conference here.
The data analysed is for the period between April and August and did not distinguish between the different Covid vaccines currently being administered in the country, said Dr Bhargava.
This information, along with more data on breakthrough infections, is expected to be made available on the India Covid-19 vaccine tracker, which will be launched on the Health Ministry’s website soon, he said.
The tracker combines data from CoWIN, the national Covid-19 testing database and the Covid-19 India portal of the Health Ministry to understand the trends in vaccination.
“The data so far has shown the same effectiveness across all age groups in preventing mortality,” Dr Bhargava added.
While the data shows only just about one per cent increase in effectiveness after the second dose, the Government has also appealed to people to ensure that they take the second dose of the vaccine.
Rajesh Bhushan, Union Health Secretary, added that the pace of vaccination has picked up in September, with an average of 7.8 million doses administered daily so far.
“The total number of doses given in the last nine days is more than 60 million, which was higher than the total doses given in the entire month of May,” he said.
On the timelines of availability of vaccines such as Moderna and Johnson & Johnson which have been given the emergency use authorisation, VK Paul, chairman, National Covid Task Force and member-health Niti Aayog said, “There are issues around it we have to find common ground with manufacturers.”