PremiumAlready booked online appointments for second dose of Covishield will remain valid and not be cancelled on COWIN platform, the union health ministry said on Sunday. Further, the government advised the beneficiaries to reschedule their appointments for a later date beyond the 84th day from the date of 1st dose vaccination.
The clarification came after reports that people who had pre-booked their appointment for the second dose in less than 84 days on CoWIN are being turned back from vaccination centres without getting the second dose of Covishield.
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Premium Premium “The requisite changes have now been done in the CoWIN digital portal. As a result, further online or on-site appointments will not be possible if the period after 1st dose date for a beneficiary is less than 84 days," the union health ministry said in a statement.
As for pre-booked beneficiary who has already picked the second dose of vaccine even if the period for him/ her is less than 84 days, COWIN system will allow vaccination of such beneficiaries, a union health ministry notification stated.
The COVID Working Group chaired by Dr N K Arora had recommended extension of the gap between the first and second doses of covishield vaccine to 12-16 weeks that was accepted by Government of India on 13th May 2021.
The change was further communicated to States and UTs. The CoWIN digital portal has also been reconfigured to reflect this extension of interval for two doses of Covishield to 12-16 weeks, the union health ministry said. The Union Government has reiterated to the States and UTs that the online appointments booked for 2nd dose of Covishield prior to this change of the interval between the two doses of Covishield, must be honoured.
The Union Health Ministry has advised the Sates/UTs that the field staff may be instructed that, if such beneficiaries do come for vaccination, the second Covishield dose must be administered and they must not be turned away. They have also been advised to undertake awareness activities to inform the beneficiaries about this change.
Government of India has so far provided more than 20 crore vaccine doses (20,28,09,250) to States/UTs, Free of Cost. Of this, the total consumption, calculated based on average up to 14th May 2021, including wastages is 18,43,67,772 doses (as per data available at 7 PM yesterday).
More than 1.84 crore covid-19 Vaccine doses (1,84,41,478) are still available with the States/UTs to be administered.
States with negative balance are showing more consumption (including wastage) than vaccine supplied as they have not reconciled the vaccine they have supplied to Armed Forces.
Furthermore, nearly 51 lakh (50,95,640) vaccine doses are in the pipeline and will be received by the States/UTs within the next 3 days.
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