BHUBANESWAR: Eleven districts in the state could not undertake Covid vaccination on Tuesday because they had no vaccine.
Around 1,000 of the state’s 1,500 vaccination sites remained shut while inoculation went on in 495 sites in 19 districts. This was down from 824 functional sites a day earlier.
The 11 districts where the vaccine drive stopped are Bhadrak, Boudh, Dhenkanal, Gajapati, Jajpur, Jharsuguda, Koraput, Nayagarh, Puri, Sambalpur and Sonepur. The districts have seen 66,787 people get the shot, including the first and second dose.
So far, 45,850,49 beneficiaries have taken the vaccine shot since its launch. Of this, 2,81,852 Covaxin shots have been given while the remaining are Covishield. The total vaccination count includes first and second dose of healthcare workers and frontline workers.
Bijay Panigrahi, director, family welfare, said the state on Tuesday received two lakh doses of Covishield and coverage would increase from Wednesday. “We are hopeful that the number of sites for vaccination will increase on Wednesday. There is no problem with infrastructure at the sites,” he said.
The capital city on Monday recorded close to 9,000 beneficiaries getting the shot in 61 sites. “There is no shortage of vaccine in the city. We have 80,000 doses in stock. People are not coming as expected because they are wary of coming out due to Covid cases going up,” said CVSN Rao, additional district urban public health officer.
The city has vaccinated 2.60 lakh beneficiaries although the number of beneficiaries taking both doses is still low at 60,000.
Officials said the daily vaccination of 45-plus age group of people is going well.