'No vaccine for tomorrow': Jharkhand urges Centre to reduce vaccine share to pvt hospitals

Stating that Jharkhand is left with just one day's stock of COVID-19 vaccines, a state health department official on Tuesday informed that the state is facing a shortage. Siddharth Tripathi, a senior Nodal officer of the Information, Education, and Communication (IEC) wing of the Health Department, said that the state does not have any vaccines left for Wednesday.

'No vaccine for tomorrow': Siddharth Tripathi

"Jharkhand is left with 82,652 vials of vaccine which is sufficient enough for today only. As of now, there is no vaccine for tomorrow. We are having talks with the central government. Hopefully, we will get some information regarding this by late evening," said Tripathi.

'Facing shortage of vaccines': Banna Gupta

Jharkhand Health Minister Banna Gupta informed that the state government will send a proposal to the Centre to reduce the share of vaccines for private hospitals in the state from 25 per cent to 5 per cent.

"We are facing a shortage of vaccines. The Centre has directed to allot 25% to private hospitals but we have decided to allocate 5% of vaccine to private hospitals. We are sending this proposal to Central Government," said Banna Gupta.

Jharkhand Additional Chief Secy's letter to Health Ministry

Meanwhile, the additional chief secretary of Jharkhand Arun Kumar Singh on Monday wrote to the Union Health Secretary of India over reducing the vaccine share for private hospitals and requested that at least 95 per cent of vaccines for the state should be allocated from the government route to enable equitable distribution of vaccines. This step would ensure adherence to the constitutional mandate of equity, equality, and reasonable opportunity for all citizens.

The letter stated that 75 per cent population of Jharkhand lives in rural areas which have a negligible reach of private hospitals. Even in the city is where private hospitals are available, on account of lack of purchasing parity, demand for COVID-19 vaccine on payment basis is very limited as Below the Poverty Line (BPL) population across the state is more than 37 per cent. Out of 24 districts, 13 are notified as tribal districts, and 19 are listed as Left Wing Extremism(LWE) commonly known as Naxalism affected districts wherein hesitancy in vaccination have been very challenging, the letter stated.

The state's additional chief secretary wrote that the Private hospitals' demand procurement of vaccines on a payment basis is very limited. As a matter of fact, only three private hospitals in the state ordered for vaccines in the earlier scheme of vaccination for the age cohort of 18-44 years that too in minimum quantity and had to struggle to utilise the available stock of vaccine

(Image Credits: PTI/BannaGupta-Facebook/Unsplash)