With COVID-19 positive cases continues to be on the rise, the district’s vaccine stock exhausted here on Monday.
As of Sunday, the district reported a total of 64,596 cases, 48,829 discharges, and 425 deaths while the active cases stood at 15,902. The positivity rate stood at 18.7% on Monday. While 1,94,963 persons above 45 years were vaccinated, 46,092 persons in the 18-44 age group were vaccinated so far. As many as 15,000 doses of vaccine arrived in the district with which vaccination was done between June 3 and 7.
Confirming this, Deputy Director of Health Services S. Soundammal told The Hindu that vaccine stock was exhausted on Monday and vaccination camps were temporarily halted. “Only after receiving the vaccine from the government, vaccination would resume”, she added. Sources said that after the arrival of vaccines, persons who are yet to receive a second shot will be given priority over persons in the 18-44 age group.
The district has run out of vaccine stock at a time when positive cases continue to be over 1,600 a day while cases are declining across the State. From June 1 to 6, the district reported 7,993 positive cases and 79 deaths as two-third of the cases continue to be reported in rural areas. Non-availability of vaccines at private hospitals, lack of dissemination of information regarding camps and number of doses available, poorly organised vaccination camps at Primary Health Centres and inadequate stock have caused inconvenience to the people who have to wander from one place to other in search of vaccines.