Odisha exceeds Covid vaccination target | Economic Times

New Delhi: As India completes one week of vaccine rollout, Odisha has emerged as the state with the highest vaccine coverage achieving over 100% of the targeted beneficiaries in most districts. Odisha had to cover 1,10,387 beneficiaries in the first week of public immunisation drive till Friday. The state covered 1,13,623 beneficiaries – an achievement of 102.9% of the planned beneficiaries. Odisha is one of the 11 states to receive both the vaccines Covaxin and Covishield. While the coverage has been 104% for Serum Institute of India’s Covishield vaccine, it has reported slightly less achievement for Covaxin at 88.9%. While the southern states of Andhra Pradesh and Karnataka have been leading in absolute numbers of inoculation of healthcare workers, Odisha is leading as far as percentage of targeted beneficiaries is concerned. Apart from Odisha, Sikkim and Lakshadweep have also covered the maximum targeted percentage of beneficiaries. However, Odisha stands out as it is a bigger state and has a large targeted population to cover. In districts like Anugul, Bhadrak and Bhubaneswar (Urban), double the targeted beneficiaries have been covered. Behind this over achievement of target is a unique strategy of scheduling more than the targeted beneficiaries for vaccination at a centre and switching to manual mode for updating Co-WIN to circumvent glitches. 80441712Speaking to ET, Odisha National Health Mission director Shalini Pandit said, “Our experience on the first day made us rethink our strategy. We realised on Day 1 that not every person to be vaccinated would turn up. So on the second day, Monday (January 18), we scheduled more than the targeted beneficiaries at a vaccination centre. This helped in covering more numbers across centres.” Like all states, Odisha also faced glitches in Co-WIN. “There were teething problems like messages were not sent to beneficiaries to reach vaccination centres and we could not upload data. So we made phone calls informing beneficiaries and we switched to manual mode. This helped us as glitches did not stop or delay the vaccination drive,” said Pandit.However, there are districts like Balangir, Kalahandi, Khordha and Rayagadha which have covered slightly less than the targeted beneficiaries. “When it comes to healthcare workers, there is enough awareness and they are willing to take the shot. But as we go down to ASHA workers and other frontline workers, we realise that we need more mobilisation. Also some districts are able to mobilise people better so there is a difference in implementation,” said Pandit.