<p>Despite 200 crore plus Covid vaccine doses being administered, India still has around four crore people who did not take the first dose and another 7-8 crore who did not take the second dose, top government officials said here on Tuesday.</p>.<p>In addition, only 7 crore of the 69 crore eligible population took the precautionary third dose, the officials said, flagging the gaps in the vaccination programme.</p>.<p>“Covid-19 is not over yet. We are currently administering 20.4 lakh doses of the precautionary shot. But the number has to go up substantially to cover the entire eligible population,” said a health ministry official.</p>.<p>The daily uptake of the third dose was quite low till mid July – just about a few lakh shots – when Prime Minister Narendra Modi announced a special 75 day campaign to get the precautionary shot free of cost at government health care centres.</p>.<p><strong>Read | <a href="https://www.deccanherald.com/national/south/booster-doses-covid-appropriate-behaviour-key-to-check-virus-spread-says-expert-1129539.html" target="_blank">Booster doses, Covid-appropriate behaviour key to check virus spread, says expert</a></strong></p>.<p>Officials blamed a sense of complacency among people for low coverage of the third dose (11%), and asserted it would be required to limit the spread of infection particularly among the high risk population.</p>.<p>“There is an element of fatigue and a sense of complacency. We have to reinvigorate the (vaccination) system,” he said.</p>.<p>Officials said six states including Karnataka report more than 1,000 new Covid-19 cases daily. Others are Kerala, Maharashtra, Tamil Nadu, Odisha and West Bengal. In another seven states, the number of new cases reported daily range between 500 and 1,000.</p>.<p>Punjab has emerged as a state of concern as the number of daily new cases has jumped by 2.5 times within a week. The average number of such cases was 254 in the July 13-19 week, but shot up to 631 in July 20-26.</p>.<p>“There are 181 districts that are reporting a weekly positivity of more than 10% in the week ending July 25. In another 107 districts, the weekly positivity varies between 5-10%,” he said.</p>.<p>For the better part of the last two weeks, the number of daily new cases remains above 20,000 with a marginal drop in the count on the weekend.</p>.<p>“Looking at the global scenario, we need to be on high alert. There is poor surveillance, poor testing and below average vaccination in many states undergoing the present surge”, V K Paul, NITI Ayog member and the Centre’s principal advisor on Covid-19 said in a review meeting last week.</p>
<p>Despite 200 crore plus Covid vaccine doses being administered, India still has around four crore people who did not take the first dose and another 7-8 crore who did not take the second dose, top government officials said here on Tuesday.</p>.<p>In addition, only 7 crore of the 69 crore eligible population took the precautionary third dose, the officials said, flagging the gaps in the vaccination programme.</p>.<p>“Covid-19 is not over yet. We are currently administering 20.4 lakh doses of the precautionary shot. But the number has to go up substantially to cover the entire eligible population,” said a health ministry official.</p>.<p>The daily uptake of the third dose was quite low till mid July – just about a few lakh shots – when Prime Minister Narendra Modi announced a special 75 day campaign to get the precautionary shot free of cost at government health care centres.</p>.<p><strong>Read | <a href="https://www.deccanherald.com/national/south/booster-doses-covid-appropriate-behaviour-key-to-check-virus-spread-says-expert-1129539.html" target="_blank">Booster doses, Covid-appropriate behaviour key to check virus spread, says expert</a></strong></p>.<p>Officials blamed a sense of complacency among people for low coverage of the third dose (11%), and asserted it would be required to limit the spread of infection particularly among the high risk population.</p>.<p>“There is an element of fatigue and a sense of complacency. We have to reinvigorate the (vaccination) system,” he said.</p>.<p>Officials said six states including Karnataka report more than 1,000 new Covid-19 cases daily. Others are Kerala, Maharashtra, Tamil Nadu, Odisha and West Bengal. In another seven states, the number of new cases reported daily range between 500 and 1,000.</p>.<p>Punjab has emerged as a state of concern as the number of daily new cases has jumped by 2.5 times within a week. The average number of such cases was 254 in the July 13-19 week, but shot up to 631 in July 20-26.</p>.<p>“There are 181 districts that are reporting a weekly positivity of more than 10% in the week ending July 25. In another 107 districts, the weekly positivity varies between 5-10%,” he said.</p>.<p>For the better part of the last two weeks, the number of daily new cases remains above 20,000 with a marginal drop in the count on the weekend.</p>.<p>“Looking at the global scenario, we need to be on high alert. There is poor surveillance, poor testing and below average vaccination in many states undergoing the present surge”, V K Paul, NITI Ayog member and the Centre’s principal advisor on Covid-19 said in a review meeting last week.</p>
