COVID-19 crisis: Dry run of vaccination process to be conducted in Punjab on Dec 28 & 29

The Punjab government on Wednesday announced that a dry run of the COVID-19 vaccination process will be conducted in Ludhiana and Shaheed Bhagat Singh Nagar districts. Punjab has been selected by the Centre to test the laid out mechanisms for novel coronavirus vaccine rollout. As per Punjab Health Minister Balbir Singh Sidhu, 5 sites in each of the aforesaid districts have been identified for this purpose. To be conducted under the leadership of the respective District Magistrate on December 28 and December 29, the dry run is aimed at giving insights on any shortcomings which can be addressed before the start of COVID-19 vaccination drive.

It entails beneficiary data upload, session site allocation, session site management to reporting and evening debriefing. The United Nations Development Programme and the World Health Organization shall support this activity. Another objective of the dry run is to assess the operational feasibility of using Co-WIN application in the field environment. The Punjab Health Minister hinted that such an exercise can also be conducted in Andhra Pradesh, Assam and Gujarat. Currently, there are 1,01,23,778 novel coronavirus cases in India out of which 96,93,173 patients were discharged and 1,46,756 fatalities are reported. 

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Vaccine development in India

Earlier on November 28, Prime Minister Narendra Modi undertook a three-city tour to conduct an extensive review of the vaccine development and manufacturing process. He visited the Zydus Biotech Park in Ahmedabad, Bharat Biotech in Hyderabad and Serum Institute of India in Pune. Expressing pride in the fact that India's indigenous vaccine development has progressed at a rapid pace, he asked the scientists for their suggestions to enhance the vaccine distribution process. At present, six vaccine candidates including Covishield and Covaxin are in the clinical trial stage in India with some of them likely to get licensed in the next few weeks.

In a boost to India's fight against COVID-19, the Drugs Controller General of India (DCGI) granted clearance to another vaccine candidate to initiate clinical trials recently. Making this announcement on December 15, Dr.VK Paul, Member (Health), NITI Aayog stated that this vaccine is being manufactured by Gennova Pharmaceuticals Ltd. in association with the Indian government's Department of Biotechnology. Observing that the technology used in this vaccine is the same as the Pfizer vaccine, he stated that the Gennova vaccine can be stored in a normal fridge. 

Read: First Indigenous Vaccine Against Pneumonia Developed By Serum Institute; To Be Launched Next Week