COVID-19: Telangana Health Min writes to Centre seeking reduction in gap between vaccines

As India prepares itself to battle against the COVID-19 variant, Omicron, Telangana Health Minister Harish Rao Thanneeru in a letter to the Union Ministry has sought for reducing the gap between both doses of COVID-19 vaccines and further also allow booster shots for front line and healthcare workers in the state. Rao in his letter addressed to the Union Health Minister Mansukh Mandaviya said that Telangana with a targeted population of 277 crores is making all its efforts to fully vaccinate the eligible people. 

He further said that a total of 3.77 crore doses of COVID vaccinations have been administered so far out of which 2.49 crore are first doses and 1.28 crore are the second ones. Adding these detail, the Telangana Minister made certain suggestions specifying the gap of 12 weeks between the two doses of COVID-19 vaccines.

"Since the gap between two doses is quite long, it often causes difficulty in covering people with the second dose. This is more difficult pronounced in the case of inter-state and intra-state migrant workers and persons from high-risk groups etc as they frequently tend to move out of the areas in which they received the first dose. Since the line lists on the Co-WIN portal for the second dose are generated according to CVC where first was received, it is difficult to track the persons for the second dose in their present locations", he said. 

Rao also pointed out that the long gap has resulted in negligence among people towards the second dose and therefore there is a need to reduce the period between both doses to at least four to six weeks. This will help in further improvement of second dose coverage, he added. 

Along with that, Health Minister T Harish Rao also sought booster shots for at least the healthcare and frontline workers and persons belonging to the high-risk groups under the view of the emergence of new variants. 

Mask rule to be re-implemented in Telangana: State Health Director

Telangana Public Health Director Dr Srinivas Rao has announced that the 'mask rule' will be again enforced in the state. Issuing a statement, he said that enforcement authorities have been directed for watching out for such citizens who are not wearing a mask. This also comes with the reinforcement of the fine of Rs 1,000 for violators. Also, people visiting public places will have to carry their double vaccination certificates and will be checked randomly by the health staff. 

While Telangana has reported 198 fresh COVID-19 cases on Friday, the death toll climbed to 397 with 2 more fatalities and 153 recoveries across the state. Also, the total number of active cases in Telangana stands at 3,723. 

(With agency inputs, Image: ANI/PTI/Facebook/@HarishRaoThanneeru)