GURUGRAM: Private hospitals on Wednesday received permission from the state health department to set up Covid-19 vaccination camps on office premises from April 1, a shot in the arm for hundreds of Indian and global companies headquartered in the city that can get eligible employees inoculated against the virus.
Vaccination camps on office premises were proposed by the Gurugram health department at the district task force meeting last week.
On Thursday, Medanta will hold a session site at the Industrial Association building in Sector 37, where it aims to inoculate 200 recipients. From April 5, other private hospitals like Max, Artemis and Fortis will also begin similar drives. While Artemis will set up camps at the Apollo Tyres office on Monday, Fortis will conduct the drive on Tuesday for Panasonic, Jindal Steel, Coforge, Honda Motorcycles and Scooters.
“We have received a good response from corporate houses in Gurugram. They will share a database of employees who can be pre-registered. Our medical teams will visit the offices and administer the vaccines.
The firms will provide the infrastructure,” said Arpita Mukherjee, vice-president (operations) at Max Hospital, which will set up camps at Powergrid, Indian OIL, Quattro, ICICI Bank, Panasonic India and Maruti Suzuki.
The health department will set up camps at three companies to begin with – PepsiCo, Maruti and Aviva Insurance. While the camp for PepsiCo will start from April 2, the camps for the other two firms will begin from Monday.
“We will vaccinate 100 recipients at Aviva and 400 more at the other two sites,” Gurugram chief medical officer Virender Yadav said, adding that 210 session sites will be set up on Thursday.
The protocols for the camps will be the same as for session sites, with adequate space for an observation room, a vaccination room, a verification room, medical infrastructure with AEFI management and a cold chain point.
An ambulance will be kept on standby on the premises. Each session site will have the hospital’s data entry operator as well.
The corporate houses will share their employee database with private hospitals to pre-register recipients.
People working in the company, irrespective of where they reside, can also walk in and show ID cards as proof of age. The session timings are 8am to 8pm.
Several companies, including, PricewaterhouseCoopers, Accenture, Grofers and Cars24, have announced that they will sponsor the cost of vaccines for their employees and their families.
Deloitte will sponsor only for its employees.
“The company will begin covering costs for its staff and their family members in this age group. After the government comes out with guidelines for the other groups, Grofers will ensure they are covered as well,” said Ankush Arora, head (HR), Grofers.
Vinod Sood, CEO and founder, Huge Sustique, said the company will organise camps at its offices. “We were trying to get the required permissions and are waiting for the government’s green signal,” he added.
Sonam Lama, people and culture head, CARS24, told TOI the firm’s first responsibility is to ensure the safety of its employees and their families.
“We back the inoculation campaign to end the pandemic as soon as possible, and encourage our employees and their families to get vaccinated at the earliest,” he added.
Meanwhile, bike taxi start-up Rapido has announced it will provide free auto rides to and from the vaccination centres for residents of Delhi-NCR. The initiative is aimed at providing a safe and accessible commute option for them, it said.
The Automotive Components Manufacturing Association (ACMA) said it is talking to other associations about holding camps in industrial areas to expedite the process of vaccination.
“We want our people to be vaccinated at the earliest so that the industry does not get affected again,” said ACMA director general Vinnie Mehta. The Confederation of Indian Industries (CII) is also in talks with its member companies for setting up vaccination camps.
The Federation of Indian Industries (FII), Haryana chapter, is also looking at early vaccinations.
“We are trying to see if the government can set up a camp in industrial areas as the workers will get free vaccines. If that does not work out, we are also in talks with a few private players,” FII general secretary Deepak Maini said.