NEW DELHI: Senior government functionaries on Friday told a parliamentary standing committee on health and family welfare that India has no plan to vaccinate the entire country against coronavirus as yet and that covering 50% to 60% of the country’s population should be enough to safeguard the population.
Government’s principal scientific adviser, Vijay Raghavan, and AIIMS director, Randeep Guleria, told the panel that India does not see any foreseeable possibility of avaccine shortage. Some members sought toknow the government’s strategy to tackle side effects of vaccines and whether persons facing adverse effects will be compensated.
Raghavan is understood to have told the panel that while the government is still working out a strategy for managing such instances, there have been no cases of adverse effects so far. Sources said he also told the House panel that the government has done its due diligence before granting approval to Covishield and Covaxin vaccines. Committee members who spoke to TOI said the government’s submissions on its preparations for the vaccination drive were “satisfactory”.