The Centre has ruled out the possibility of COVID-19 vaccination centres (CVCs) in old age homes and long-term care facilities, as CVCs have to meet certain requirements to provide safe vaccination. This has irked authorities of old age homes and other long-term care facilities.
The Centre’s “No” follows a request from Karnataka seeking permission to set up CVCs beyond health facilities (such as old age homes, long-term care facilities, apartment complexes and identified polling booths) to ramp up vaccination coverage among the elderly.
In a letter dated March 17 addressed to Jawaid Akhtar, Additional Chief Secretary (Health and Family Welfare), Vandana Gurnani, Union Additional Secretary and Mission Director, National Health Mission (NHM), has said that CVCs should have adequate space for vaccination, adequate cold chain arrangements for vaccine storage, arrangements for management of Adverse Events Following Immunisation (AEFI).
Complex issues
“These facilities would then also need to be registered on CoWIN to enable session planning, reporting of AEFI and allocation of vaccines. Based on the analysis done from Co-WIN, it is observed that out of 460 private health facilities empanelled under Ayushman Bharat - Arogya Karnataka (AB-ArK) in the State, only 55 are registered on Co-WIN,” the letter stated.
“Covering all these centres would surely make the vaccination services more accessible to the target population with special consideration for the elderly. In view of the above, it would be advisable that the State may consider limiting the vaccination services to health facilities as permitted by the Centre,” said the letter, adding that instead people could be brought to CVCs in special vehicles.
This has angered representatives of old age homes and other long-term care facilities, who said they will continue to urge the government to organise vaccination camps in their premises considering the implications on the lives of more than 2,00,000 elders residing in such homes in the country.
Risks involved
“There are 4,000 long-term elder care facilities and old age homes in India. Most of the inmates live with co-mmorbidities, dementia, mental disorders, and are bedridden. There are not only logistical challenges but also serious health concerns for such elders if they have to visit hospitals for vaccination. Such homes cannot be compared with apartment complexes,” said S. Premkumar Raja, secretary and trustee of Nightingales Medical Trust (NMT).
On the cold chain issue, he said, “In our country, vaccines such as DPT, BCG, Measles, which also need to be kept at temperatures of 2-8 degrees are administered successfully at the village level by nurses. If that was possible, the same can be replicated for Covishield or Covaxin,” he said. Mobile vaccination units are equipped with all facilities and faculty, he added.
