Vaccination drive to renew tomorrow in Maharashtra, with or with out Co-WIN

The Maharashtra authorities is about to restart the Covid-19 vaccination drive within the state from Tuesday.
The state had determined to maintain the drive, which started on Saturday, in abeyance for a few days following widespread complaints in regards to the Co-WIN (Covid Vaccine Intelligence Network) app, a software program designed for real-time registration of knowledge of people who find themselves vaccinated.
However, with the Union authorities directing all states that the complete course of must resume and may proceed with out Co-WIN software program in areas the place there are technical glitches, the Maharashtra authorities stated that it’ll resume the drive from Tuesday.
Across the state, 28,500 healthcare staff can be shortlisted for vaccination on Tuesday. The quantity additionally contains 10,200 healthcare staff who had missed their jab on January 16.
The drive can be undertaken on 4 days of the week. “It will mostly be Tuesday, Wednesday, Friday and Saturday. But that can change if needed. If the Co-WIN text message system does not work, we will call up beneficiaries to inform them a day or two in advance,” stated Dr D N Patil, state immunisation officer.
Co-Win is a digital platform to observe vaccine distribution and report information of all beneficiaries. On the primary day of the vaccine rollout on Saturday, the applying didn’t work in lots of the 285 centres throughout Maharashtra. In some centres, the server couldn’t hook up with it, and in some, the vaccination “session list” didn’t open.
In a number of centres, the software program didn’t ship textual content messages to beneficiaries to intimate them about their centres and the time of vaccination. Most centres had been compelled to conduct vaccination with out Co-WIN.
D N Patil stated all information of beneficiaries was famous in bodily copies or spreadsheets and can be uploaded on Co-WIN over the subsequent two days.
Maharashtra had shortlisted 28,500 docs, nurses, paramedics, ASHAs and auxiliary nurse midwives for the January 16 vaccination drive. Only 18,328 (64.3 per cent) turned up. Those who missed the shot can be reminded thrice earlier than their identify is faraway from the record.
On Tuesday, districts can have the selection to go utterly offline if Co-WIN doesn’t work. An inventory of beneficiaries can be drawn up centre-wise and distributed to them. “Names can be verified from the list and vaccine shots can be given. If Co-WIN works, this process will be online,” D N Patil stated.
On Saturday, the Brihanmumbai Municipal Corporation (BMC) needed to name every of the 4,000 beneficiaries in Mumbai to request them to return for vaccination when the textual content message system of Co-Win failed.
Civic officers stated they might need to manually select one other 4,000 beneficiaries for the second spherical and name them up if the software program fails to work once more. “The names will be distributed to 24 ward war rooms. From there, calls will be made to beneficiaries,” an official stated.
Meanwhile, to beat hesitancy over Covaxin, which remains to be present process Phase III trial, Dr Lalit Sankhe – answerable for Covaxin vaccination at JJ hospital in Mumbai – stated video conferencing could also be performed to debate this difficulty and brainstorm options.

“The Union ministry was informed about the low turnout for Covaxin. Several heads of departments had turned up for vaccination in our centre. This may encourage others. We are hopeful of a better turnout in the next round,” Sankhe stated.
State officers, too, consider that two components led to poor turnout for the general vaccination drive – weekend and beneficiaries being intimated in regards to the vaccine schedule on the final minute.
“These are new vaccines with no prior experience to account for. Taking this into account, 64 per cent turnout is okay. Let us see how many people turn up on Tuesday,” stated Dr Archana Patil, Director (Family Welfare) of Directorate of Health Services and answerable for total Covid remedy and vaccination within the state.