West Bengal preparing to vaccinate people free of cost: CM Mamata Banerjee

West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee Sunday announced that her government is arranging to provide free Covid-19 vaccines to all residents. “I am happy to announce that our government is making arrangements to facilitate the administration of covid-19 vaccine to all the people of the state without any cost,” ANI quoted Banerjee as saying.

In an open letter, Banerjee said the COVID warriors, including police, home guards, civil defence volunteers, correctional home and disaster management employees, will be administered the vaccine on a priority basis.

“I am happy to inform that our government is making arrangements for reaching the vaccine to all people of the state free of any charge,” the chief minister said in the letter addressed to the frontline workers.

Banerjee expressed her gratitude to all the COVID warriors for their selfless service to the people of West Bengal.

Bengal conducted a dummy vaccination drill along with the rest of the country on January 8, at three centres in every district. The trail run gave insights on proper administration of vaccine shots and validation of data in CoWIN app.

“With this trial, we all are now prepared to protect our countrymen by vaccinating them. The trial run will help the frontline workforce and people get the vaccine quickly and safely as per the prescribed phase-wise rollout,” said an official.

The state government has prepared a list of healthcare staff first in line to receive the dosage. For this, Oxford- Astrazeneca’s “Covishield” vaccine is likely to arrive in Kolkata from Pune’s Serum Institute.

Before Bengal, several states including Kerala, Tamil Nadu and Madhya Pradesh have announced free vaccines for their citizens once the roll out starts. India is set to begin its Covid-19 inoculation drive on January 16, the central government announced in a press release on Saturday.

In its first phase, priority will be given to about 3 crore frontline workers, followed by around 27 crore people above the age of 50 and others with co-morbidities.

With ENS