BENGALURU: While private hospitals are gearing up to join the nationwide inoculation drive under Phase 2 of the
Covid-19 vaccination programmed from Monday, they are still awaiting delivery of vaccines. The government is also yet to commit on the number of doses each hospital will receive.
The government has said a list of empanelled hospitals will begin vaccinating those above 60 years of age and people above 45 years with specific comorbid conditions. “So far, no vaccines have been delivered to hospitals, but we are expecting them to arrive tomorrow (Monday),” said Dr HM Prasanna, president, Private Hospitals and Nursing Homes Association (PHANA). “It is not yet clear how many doses will be supplied to each hospital.”
Besides state-run facilities, two private hospitals in each district have been selected to administer the dose, while Bengaluru will see 18 hospitals administer the jab, said Dr Rajani N, Karnataka immunisation director.
“We are not looking at supplying vaccines daily,” Dr Rajani said. “Hospitals will be supplied with as many doses as they need based on their capacity and the number of registrations. For example, if a hospital has enough registrations to vaccinate for four days, it will get those many doses,” she said.
Dr Prasanna said the registration process was yet to begin as the Co-Win app hasn’t been made accessible to people. “We are getting a number of inquiries but are unable to register. We’ve been told that the app will be accessible from 9am tomorrow (Monday),” he said.
Rajani said that while walk-in or on-site registrations will be allowed, the priority will be for online registrations. “Once people who’ve registered online are catered to, vaccines will be made available for walk-ins,” she said.
As of 7am on Sunday, Karnataka had expended 8,18,722 doses of both Covishield and Covaxin vaccines. The state has received more than 17.1 lakh doses of vaccine (including 1.6 lakh of Covaxin). All vaccines Karnataka has received have an expiry date of May 2021 and the state is eager to use them before that to prevent waste. Rajani said private hospitals could even vaccinate more than 100 people a day if they have the capacity to do so.