The rollout of covid-19 vaccination in India to the general public was designed to cover the elderly population first. Those over 60 started receiving their jabs from March 1 and those over 45 from April 1. But six months later, India administered just 125 doses per 100 people in the 45 and over age group, compared to the required 200 doses per 100.
For Jharkhand and Tamil Nadu, that number is less than 100 doses, while Uttar Pradesh, Bihar and Punjab only crossed the bar this week. Worryingly, the pace of immunization coverage in those states has slowed over the past four weeks, the data shows.
The country had prioritized the population aged 45 and over as the severity of infection tends to be higher in this age group. Vaccination reduces the risk of hospitalization and death. A recent study from Public Health England showed that even against the Delta variant, the effectiveness of Covishield was 33% with a single dose and 60% with both doses. India does not publish first and second dose distributions by age group. However, assuming that the 430 million doses given to this age group covered the first dose for the 345 million people over 45, that would mean that 75% have not yet received their second injection.
The five poorly performing states, which together gave only 101 doses per 100 population, account for 39% of India’s population aged 45 and over. In addition, in those states, immunization coverage rose 4% last week, down from 7.4% four weeks ago. In Jharkhand and Tamil Nadu, which have the lowest immunization coverage at 90 and 92 doses per 100 people, respectively, growth has been even slower.
Chinese Boosters
Growth in weekly immunization coverage in India slowed to 4.1% this week from 5.7% a week earlier. It has retained its fourth position among the most populous countries for the third week now. Indonesia and Bangladesh kept their first places.
Indonesia has now administered 58 doses per 100 inhabitants (compared to 54 doses per 100 inhabitants a week earlier). Earlier this week, he received 688,800 doses of AstraZeneca from France on COVAX. It has also approved the three-dose Chongqing Zhifei Biological Products vaccine, making it the fourth Chinese vaccine authorized for emergency use in the country.
The World Health Organization (WHO) has recommended that people over 60 who have received two doses from Chinese manufacturers Sinovac and Sinopharm receive a third booster dose. Both vaccines have so far been approved for use in 105 countries, all in the middle and low income category.
Festive concerns
India has reported 1,27,506 new cases of covid-19 in the past seven days, its lowest in a week since early March.
Kerala accounted for 54% of all new cases reported in the country in the past week, up from 56% the week before. The number of new infections fell in all 14 districts of Kerala for the second week in a row.
The other hotspot, Mizoram, also reported a drop in cases for the first time in 18 weeks. It reported 8,380 new cases this week, up from 9,408 cases last week.
West Bengal and Odisha were the only two states to report an increase, up 6.3% and 9.5% respectively. Fourteen of West Bengal’s 23 districts reported an increase amid the festivities, with Kolkata crossing 1,000 new cases for the first time in 15 weeks. Eight of Odisha’s 31 districts have reported more than 100 cases each this week.
Perfect ten
India reported 1,586 covid-related deaths last week, 11.4% fewer than the week before. Sixteen states and union territories have reported a drop in the number of deaths. Six reported no change, while 10 reported no deaths.
Kerala continued to report the highest number of deaths (760), even though it was down 10.2% from two weeks ago. Maharashtra is far behind with 308 deaths.
Three northeastern states – Assam, Meghalaya and Mizoram – along with Gujarat and Himachal Pradesh are the only ones to report an increase this week. Only 12 districts in the country have reported more than 50 deaths this week – nine from Kerala and three from Maharashtra. Eight of those 12, including seven from Kerala, reported fewer deaths this week. Thiruvananthapuram has reported 109 deaths, up from 60 last week, and is the only district to report more than 100 deaths.
(howindialives.com is a public data database and search engine)
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