Pune Metropolitan Region’s vaccine coverage plummets amid shortage

PUNE: The Covid-19 vaccination drive in the Pune Metropolitan Region hit a record low number of beneficiaries on Sunday with just over 10,000 vaccinations.
Officials said over 400 vaccination sites were forced to stay shut because of the ongoing vaccination shortage.
On Sunday, only 10,397 people received their jabs, including senior citizens, healthcare workers and frontline staff. In Pimpri Chinchwad, where the PCMC had better vaccine reserves, more than 7,000 people were vaccinated. The PMC areas were next with 1,706 recipients and in Pune rural 1,364 got their shots.
Sanjay Deshmukh, assistant director (medical), Pune circle, said a Covishield supply, which should have landed early on Saturday, arrived only by around Sunday 11am. Many vaccination sites were unable to launch sessions due to the delay.
"On Sunday, we received 1 lakh doses. Of which, 55,000 have been distributed to Pune rural due to their high coverage levels. The PMC has been given 35,000 doses and the PCMC, which was given 10,000 doses on Saturday, has been allocated 10,000 more," Deshmukh said.
Besides the Covishield supply, the district health services has also distributed nearly 8,000 Covaxin doses — Pune rural got 4,000 doses, PMC got 3,000 and 1,000 doses were set aside for the PCMC.
The current stock, Deshmukh said, will be enough for drives till Tuesday. He said the district will get another batch of shots on the same day.
As for the May 1 launch of drives among those over 18, he said officials were still waiting for guidelines from the state government.
Rajesh Patil, PCMC commissioner, said inconsistent vaccine distribution has led to reduced response in several areas.
In Pune rural, Ayush Prasad, the CEO of the zilla parishad, said vaccine scarcity was the key reason for Sunday's meagre coverage.
This entire weekend has been bad for vaccine coverage in Pune district. On Saturday, the daily number of beneficiaries covered was just over 24,000 with as many as 217 vaccination sites left unable to hold sessions.
Saturday's district total of 24,157 was the lowest since April 9, when 23,776 beneficiaries received their shots. By the end of Saturday, the Pune rural administration was left with just 3,520 doses of Covishield. The PMC had only 866 of the shots in its reserves and the PCMC had 1,058.
Many hospitals said they were continuing to give only the Covaxin second dose and holding on to their low Covishield reserves.
The ongoing weekend curfew has also impacted turnouts. Many citizens said they have been unable to step out and search for vaccination sites with shots due to the curbs.
Scores of Covishield recipients — from the elderly to those over 45 — are due for the follow-up shot across the region.