PATNA: CM Nitish Kumar on Tuesday said the government is fully prepared for Covid-19 vaccination in the state.
Talking to the media on the sidelines of a state government’s event here, Nitish said his government has made all necessary preparations for smooth conduct of vaccination exercise across the state.
“The
vaccine will be given to the frontline healthcare workers and doctors on
priority basis. After that, all frontline workers in police and civil administration will be given priority. All elected people’s representatives and common people above 50 years of age would also be given priority in the vaccination. Besides these, those who have suffered from Covid-19, irrespective of their age would be vaccinated,” Nitish said and added, “We will follow the Centre’s guidelines and conduct the vaccination exercise in a very effective way.
Nitish also said India has developed indigenous Covid-19 vaccines. “As per the requirement, we will start giving the vaccine shots to priority groups as per the Centre’s guidelines. In the later stages, we will vaccinate all people,” he said.
His statement came days after the Drugs Controller General of India (DCGI) last week announced “restricted emergency use’ of two Covid-19 vaccines — Bharat Biotech's Covaxin and Serum Institute of India’s Covishield.
Referring to the new coronavirus strain, Nitish said, “Another round of coronavirus strain has started. Even though vaccines have arrived, people should be careful and take all possible precautions till the Covid-19 is controlled fully.”
When asked for his comment on the Samajwadi Party (SP) chief and former UP CM Akhilesh Yadav, who stoked a controversy by asserting that he will not take the “BJP vaccine” and later clarified that he did not question experts or researchers involved in the vaccine making process, the
Bihar CM said, “I am not interested in these matters. Some people make statements just to remain in the news.”
To a question, the CM also announced that he would resume his popular mass contact programme ‘Janata Ke Darbar Mein Chief Minister’ soon after the Covid-19 pandemic comes under control. The CM said he had already decided to resume the weekly programme.
Earlier, the CM addressed an awareness programme on the Jal-Jeevan-Hariyali Abhiyan at the Adhiveshan Bhavan here. The CM enumerated in detail the works executed by his government under the programme.