Thiruvananthapuram: Just 826 get nod for priority jabs in 18-44 age category

THIRUVANANTHAPURAM: Barely 2% applications received from the age group 18-44 years, with co-morbidities, was approved for Covid-19 vaccination in the state on Monday.
Numerous applicants failed to furnish sufficient documents and some even misused the platform by uploading blank documents and photos. Of the 50,000 applications received from priority groups in the age category, the health team verified around 45,000 documents of which only 826 were approved.
511 applicants were vaccinated on Monday and vaccine sessions for this age group could not be held in around five districts for want of sufficient numbers of beneficiaries. The team has to meet a target of 1.5 crore in this age group.
The government had decided to prioritize the available dosage of vaccines for people with comorbidities in the age group 18-44 years. The health team spent the past three days processing and verifying each application to identify the applicants. “In many cases, we found Aadhaar cards, photos and even blank pages being uploaded. While some may have done out of ignorance, it seemed others were intentionally playful.
Only a very few people actually uploaded the documents in prescribed format and got the necessary certificates from the hospitals. This has affected the progress and pace of the vaccination drive for the younger age group,” said a health department official.
The department enlisted 20 comorbidities for determination of vaccination eligibility in the age group 18-44 years. A certificate in prescribed format also needs to be filled in by a registered medical practitioner to identify individuals with co-morbidities that enhance the risk of mortality. The guidelines clearly mandated that the information furnished, if found bogus, would be rejected.
“We plan to intensify our awareness campaign for this age group. Even if they are not serious, the message has to be conveyed to such people on how important it is to cover this age group as quickly as possible, especially those who are immunocompromised. The second wave has been particularly severe on this age group, and wastage of time and resource over such an enormous number of erroneous applications is something we cannot afford,” an official said.
The health team could administer just 132 vaccines to beneficiaries in the priority age group of 18-44 on Monday in the capital. The health department has also received requests from central and government departments, food delivery chains seeking priority for this age group for vaccination sessions.