Health Minister urges states to rope in stakeholders for full COVID vaccination

New Delhi, Nov 22: Union Health Minister Mansukh Mandaviya on Monday urged the states to rope in various stakeholders including NGOs, faith-based organisations, religious leaders, community influencers and other partners towards full COVID vaccination. “We are in the last lap of COVID-19 vaccination. Let us launch aggressive campaign to ensure full COVID-19 vaccination by increasing the pace of vaccination and expanding the coverage,” informed the Minister. Mandaviya virtually interacted with health secretaries and senior officials of the Health Department from Manipur, Meghalaya, Nagaland and Puducherry. He chaired to review the status of COVID 19 vaccination in these states/UT and the progress under the Har Ghar Dastak campaign. These states/UT have been reporting low vaccination coverage.While India's first dose coverage is at 82% and second dose coverage at 43%, Puducherry (66%, 39%), Nagaland (49%, 36%), Meghalaya (57%, 38%) and Manipur (54%, 36%) lag behind from national average in their first and second dose coverage. Reiterating that vaccination is the most potent weapon in the fight against COVID19 pandemic, the Union Health Minister urged the States/UT to innovatively rope in all stakeholders including NGOs, faith-based organisations, religious leaders, community influencers and other partners to motivate and mobilise all eligible population towards full COVID Vaccination. “Let us ensure collectively that no eligible citizen is left without the ‘Suraksha Kawachh’ of COVID19 vaccine in the country, and to address issues of hesitancy, misinformation, superstition etc,” he added. Mandaviya urged the states to deploy all state government officials, one day each week, to visit each eligible household to motivate and mobilise them to towards full vaccination. He reiterated Prime Minister’s mop-up strategies for strengthening the ‘Har Ghar Dastak’ campaign including deploying ‘Prachar Toli’in advance to villages which would ensure mobilisation and counselling of the eligible population along with awareness campaigns, followed by the ‘Vaccination Toli’ who would ensure that all eligible citizens are vaccinated with the first and second dose.