50L vaccine shots in month, drive gathers steam in Punjab

Chandigarh, September 12

Punjab’s Covid vaccination drive, which had been running on a slow pace due to shortage of supply from the Centre, seems to have gained momentum in the past few weeks as in the past 30 days, around 54 lakh doses of vaccine were given in the state.

Till last month, Punjab was labelled as one of the worst-performing states in the country when it came to vaccinating the population above 60 years.

However, the situation started changing last month as the Chief Minister took up the matter with the Union Health Ministry. As per official figures, till August 12, the department administered 1.07 crore doses of vaccine and now, the figure has reached 1.61 crore. With these figures, the state has already vaccinated more than 57 per cent of the eligible population, with the first dose administered to around 1.2 crore and second to around 40 lakh people. — TNS